Fallout: Lost Orleans
by BJSC
Summary: A story in progress. The Post apocalypse still hums with the secrets of the Old World in haunting soliloquy. There's something lurking in the warped willows of the south. Something not altogether human. It's been waiting. And now, just as forces have become aware of the greatest pre-war tech and are racing to grasp it, Lawman finds himself caught up in the fight of his life.
1. Intro and Scene 1

**Lost Orleans**

No one knows the year.

The chronometer just ticks uselessly on the dust strewn desk as Oscar scavenged the dilapidated building, shafts of pale light filtering through the windows above, murky as moonshine. He picks it up cautiously for a moment, the hazy green light from its screen gleaming dimly, and gives it a few taps. Despite its faint glow it wouldn't give the time, the year, the date. That was lost – locked behind a series of digital eights that blinked up at him, as though non-plussed. As though, in this crust of a bygone world, it too couldn't fathom the depths of time. The secret mechanics that whirred and clunked within the confines of its rusted shell were long since broken.

 _Still the scrap parts might fetch something back at the Post_ , he thought. The savvy, old scavver pocketed the thing and then sifted through the other drawers, pulling them out one by one, and one by one they clattered to the floor as they were robbed of any mechanism, any device that might fetch some caps.

The Post was Oscar's home. The only home a person can have in this land for miles around. It was surrounded by overgrown wastes, tribals, old towns invaded by looming trees and the snaking river Mississippi. It was an outpost – a waystation for traders between the NCR dominated west and the Commonwealth to the east. Such stations dappled the long road between these sparks of civilization as something like a new silk road sprawled between them.

There were a few old world cities near the Post too. They were cities that once gleamed in neon – warm and inviting, almost like one of those ladies dressed to dazzle in the old world posters; hot with action, bustle, sass and life. Those old world cities were now unrecognizable; looming towers of scorched concrete erect upon scorched earth, eldritch and as forgotten as that chronometer: still with the echoes of a distant past, the same one every eerie city beckoned you to with its posters and dusty record albums; a golden age that was now lost forever in the depths of time. It was all gone because the fire had consumed it. The fire had ate-ate-ate it…

In his pockets the chronometer blink-blinked that same series of eights.

…but, in some ways, that world was still there. It haunted the old world songs that crackled from mended record players. Its pulse beat through from the past in haunting soliloquy. It was still there, in the ruins of the old world, like a ghost. You could always feel it filter through from the past and touch you, like the shadow of a whisper; a murmur.

Now Oscar moved, lithely, stealthily from the desk through the hall, his body tracing around the light, keeping to shadows where he could, so no one who happened to be there might spot him. There are many hard ways to make a living out in the wastes. Shooting a scavver and stealing his loot ain't one of them. He kept an eye out for traps as he moved. You didn't stay alive as a scavenger for long without taking extra care while moving through these old buildings. You never knew what you might find…

He moved into a corridor and up a flight of stairs before stopping in front of a goddamn door. Yes, it really was a _goddamn_ door. It was steel plated, barred and bolted, locked sideways, front ways, back ways - locked every which _goddamn_ way, and yet Oscar cracked a smile. Excitedly, he pulled out the thermite and set it against the door. _No door messed with the Post._ He chuckled lightly to himself as he ignited it and rushed to one side. _Especially, when there's bound to be the haul of the century on the other side…_

The flash was over in a few moments and the door collapsed to the ground with a tremendous clang.

The sound reverberated through the building. He drew his gun and waited, straining his ears for any sound, inside or outside the building.

There was nothing. The man's smile broadened. Then it slipped from his face.

He moved in and was crestfallen to find an ordinary office, almost perfectly preserved. Pristine. Empty. His eyes narrowed with suspicion. This wasn't normal. He might have expected a vault, some kind of… well… treasure – but this? He stepped into the room as he holstered his weapon.

The man was almost awed by the silence as he stepped around the steel door and paced his way to a desk, like the others he had searched through, and stood there dumbfounded.

 _Fuck!_ He'd wasted thermite for this? He pawed his way through the drawers anyway, pocketing a broken watch, hauling a fan, some gears of some broken device, a key, a gold medallion (well, at least that was something), and then, upon consideration, a computer cassette labelled "V.T. Guide". The man checked out the rest of the room for any hidden safes, any secret doors, but from the room's dimensions and layout he knew he was searching in vain. When he found nothing he sighed, resigning himself for a loss on the day and set off out of the South's most heavily guarded admin office. _Must have been one paranoid boss to have that as his office door,_ he thought. It didn't concern him too much. What did concern him was his own boss and how he'd start yammering about the damn thermite. _Yeah, it sure was a goddamn door…_

He'd noticed the walls were lead lined too, and this might have unsettled him if it weren't for the figure that suddenly barred his path.

Oscar froze.

The figure paced forward.

Oscar reached for his gun.

The figure's arm was a blur as three belches of smoke streamed forth from the figure's own gleaming barrel.

It took a few moments before Oscar noticed the white hot pain, or that he was slumped against the wall, or that he was choking on his own blood. He stared wide eyed at the figure as it continued to calmly pace towards him, feet not making a sound, as though it walked on fucking air. Beads of cold sweat glistened on Oscar's brow as his eyes absorbed the details he hadn't caught before – the overcoat, the black tattoo…across its face, like a crucifix… the lifeless eyes.

Mr Graves looked down at the scavver with those black eyes, before reaching down and rifling through the man's pockets. The scavver spluttered, "fuck y…" as he made a futile strike at the figure.

The figure snapped his arm single-handedly, as though it were a twig. Oscar yelped as he stared down at his disjointed limb and the figure silently rose with the cassette labelled "V.T. Guide" in one hand and the chronometer in the other one. He pocketed the cassette and dropped the chronometer. It clattered to the ground.

Mr Graves then turned and left the building. No man would come after him – and even if they did, if they were so foolhardy, they wouldn't find him. He stepped outside the building – a vast complex with the letters V. . U. L. T. T. E. C. running along the side – before slipping away through the desolate town and disappearing into the looming willows beyond.

Oscar bled to death as the chronometer slowly wound down, blinking its last series of eight's as its electric pulse died away, and the dying pulse of a bygone world with it. He didn't know why the figure only took the cassette; he didn't truly know what he was dying for. The world faded around the lone scavver, and whatever secrets it may have held vanished with it. So much has changed since the last pulse of those eldritch cities.

But war… War never changes.

Act 1

Scene 1

Oswald exhaled from his cigar, the haze of blue tinted smoke wafting up to the rafters of the cabin he shared with the other man. They sat opposite each other. He was the wealthy proprietor of the Post, trade mogul and 'entrepreneur' sat in a plush Brahmin hide seat, leaning back behind his desk and delighting in his cigar in the half lit room. Early morning southern sunlight peeked through the wooden blinds behind him, casting Oswald in a large and round silhouette – _almost like_ , _whassisname, the Hitchcock guy from those old world shows._ Lawman, on the other hand, was less comfortable.

"Sure you don' wan' a cigar, Lawman?" Oswald drawled. Lawman – that was a hell of a name he picked up now wasn't it. He wasn't a lawman no more of course. That was a whole world ago. That didn't stop them calling him it though. You can take the man out of the law and shoot him in the back, but you can't take the law out of the man. Not this man anyway, so they said.

Lawman fidgeted in his chair. His hair was silver-grey now and he looked like he'd seen many gunfights and not always come out entirely on top. His hands itched for the whiskey he spotted on the sideboard.

"Or you're always welcome to some hooch," Oswald smiled as he watched the man's hands. _Damn him! And damn his own thirst._ But he didn't refuse as a drink was poured for him and placed on his side of the desk.

Lawman downed it in one gulp. Oswald showed no surprise.

"I'll get straight to the point, Lawman. I'm pulling together a team. It ain't the most slick team of gunslingers that ever crossed God's country but I can make do with a few thieves, former raiders, you know the sort. How you finding merc business anyway?"

"It pays the bills well enough, more than what being sheriff ever did," Lawman grunted.

"There ain't no law here. Just business."

Lawman said nothing.

"This team," Oswald continued, his chair creaking as he shifted his weight, "I want it to go on a scavenger hunt."

"The usual drill?"

"Not even. You will be travelling south. Deep South." Oswald peered through the haze of smoke. "How do you feel about that?"

Lawman had heard of this South. The post was deep in frontier territory itself, surrounded by tribals only kept at bay by a palisade on one side, the Mississippi on the other and a sizeable tribute. The tribals even then would still raid caravans from time to time and engage in guerrilla warfare, but hey, that's home sweet home for ya.

Now that's the Post, and it ain't tame by any man's measure, but that's the post. Then there's _South_.

"Marshes, swamps, mirelurks, gatorclaws, radioactive fog and voodoo crazies who make our tribal friends look like fairy godmothers. And here I was just thinking I needed a holiday."

"Lost cities," Oswald countered, "treasure, and, above all… _technology untouched by the brotherhood of steel_."

"The brotherhood of steel isn't barmy enough to have ever gone that far south…"

"Wrong. They have sent a detachment south. Recently."

"What? Why?"

"I don't know, but I can hazard a guess."

"Well. Guess away, then," Lawman gestured, and then said, "somethings happening down there isn't there. Something… something has stirred the hornet's nest." It wasn't a question. And that was exactly what the south was – a hornet's nest. The great war had blasted most of the continent into a barren wasteland but the further south you went the more the radiation seemed to have the opposite effect. Perhaps it was the climate, but the mutations were unlike anything else and the terrain had been changed permanently. The South was almost a dense jungle of warped willows, vines and mires. Lakes pooled within dark forests to make passage almost impenetrable. On top of that the ever present mists disrupted compasses. It was as though the South had undergone a tectonic shift – it might as well have done, because most of the old world cities there had been lost for generations.

"Evidence has been found by some travelling walk the wastes fuck that there exists tech in the south. Tech that has remained untouched since the great war. He stumbled across it in the south and had a tape to prove it. It was a Vault Tec research facility. Some sort of hub. A data collection point for all vault info. All vault technology is collected at one central node and that node is located…"

"…South."

"…The city of sin itself." Oswald's greed flashed in his eyes as his voice became hushed with excitement. "New Orl-."

" _Lost_ Orleans, you mean."

Oswald slammed his fist on the table in a sudden spark of rage. "Don't fucking interrupt me!"

Lawman raised an eyebrow. Oswald cleared his throat. "As I was saying," he said, straightening his tie, "You're right. _Lost_ Orleans. And it's a damn good job it's lost too because that wasteland fuck of a traveller I told you about, went around jabberin' to everyone! That's how I know about it. And now I know others are looking for that tech too…

"Oscar. I sent him on a simple scavenging trip to Vault tec's southern headquarter's. that's not too far from here. Thought it'd be an easy mark."

"So what happened, Oswald?"

"Someone shot him, Lawman. Someone fucking shot him dead. I don't know which son of a bitch did it but clearly someone else had the same idea to look there."

"Coulda been a raid…"

"No items were taken from him. He was found with what he was haulin'."

There was a chill silence as the two men took that in.

"Forces are on the move, and they're already ahead of us. The brotherhood of Steel is already moving in from the east and if they've heard word then how long before the NCR send a squadron of vertibirds that-a way. The hunt has already started, and if we don't get there first we might just be standing slap bang in the middle of a gunfight between our trading partner and those self-appointed, self-righteous, holier than thou fucks!"

" _Christ_ …" Lawman moaned. "You know I hate it when you get all geopolitical on my ass."

"Well, there's a lot riding on this. That's what I'm saying, Lawman. Your home is the same as my home after all. We're in this same boat together, you and I."

"Surely if it comes to gunslinging it will be happening in that devils sweat sack down south?"

"How long before it comes to us?"

There was no answer to that question. Trade was the one lifeline that the post had. Blood and sweat had gone into converting the area around here into a safe traversable path where Brahmin packs and convoy systems could be established. The Post had little else.

If trade dried up the caravan companies would up sticks and then what? We'd all be tribals again, tribals with a pretty fort, sure, but no money to pay off the other tribals who would surely attack us. The Post started life as a point of contact between the local tribes and the caravan companies, a sort of gathering point where access to safe passage was negotiated. Soon the Post grew into a settlement with company employees forming a permanent population. Then some tribes would assimilate, join the Post and it's "easy livin'". Nothing easy about it really but it provided opportunities tribal life did not, like the opportunity to gamble away everything you own at the card tables or to explore with a convoy, or, hell, the opportunity to drown your sorrows with booze and forget your past. The temptation for many overcame tribal traditions. For other tribals, well, the company dealt with them in other ways. Those ways usually involved finding the right tribal leaders and setting one tribe against another. Byzantine politics it was called back in the old world. _It's one hell of an ace to pull out of ya sleeve, that's for sure._

Oswald seemed to know what Lawman was thinking because next he said, "And what would happen to us if trade were disrupted? Now see, finding this Tech for ourselves would be one hell of a boon – we just sell to the highest bidder, while keeping our involvement hush hush. Anonymous buyer and all that shit. I know how to pull the strings, but if some other group catches wind of it and snatches it from us, well, who knows what could happen. Uncertainty is bad for business. And war is bad for law. Being that there is no law in war. Only blood. You see my problem."

"And so you want me and a collection of cut-throats to travel all the way down south to the heart of darkness and pull out some data file from somewhere, which god knows not where and god knows not what soul dare visit, so that you can get rich…"

"So we can be rich, Lawman! Equal shares all round."

"Equal shares?"

"Square as square can be. Just find me the data file and it's yours. Do it for the money, do it for the Post, or do it to spare this land from a standoff between the two main powers across this nuclear fire blasted continent – I don't care. But that's the job."

"And why me. Why the hell involve me?"

"Because I know you, Lawman. I know you're square. I know you're true to your word, straight as an arrow. Sure I can hire men quicker than you, stronger than you, more skilled than you, I sure as hell can hire them younger than you, and no offense meant there now, but you ain't no spring chicken no more, you know what I'm sayin'." Lawman did but just shrugged as if to say he could give any spring chicken a run for their money. Oswald smiled his big greasy smile. "But you're the one I can trust, Lawman. And in this business that's priceless."

"Uh-huh," Lawman said, sizing up what he'd just heard and deciding he smelled bullshit. "Or maybe you just need me 'cause I'm the only goddamn guy with a pip-boy for hundreds of miles around."

Oswald just shrugged as he sank back in his chair, but his beady eyes watched Lawman shrewdly. "Maybe you are. And maybe that's a factor, Lawman. A pip-boy is invaluable and probably necessary to open any vault come to that – short of a ton of thermite. Of course," he chuckled, "It had been suggested to me by some of the others that we just slit your throat and take the Pip-boy for ourselves, but I told our boys, 'now see here I know Lawman and he's a damn straight shooter, and no mistake. He will be an excellent addition to the team and I won't take kindly to any talk of doin' him harm'."

"I'm so grateful you've got my back Oswald," Lawman replied dryly. "You want that I go on an expedition with these cut-throats who'd sooner stab me in the back as look at me?"

"Why not? You've dealt with these types before."

"Yeah, back when I was a Sheriff I was exchanging a few rounds of lead with them. Not sure that makes for a good start to any platonic relationship."

Oswald waved a pudgy hand as though this was of little consideration. "It's a… colourful group, that's for sure. They ain't just thieves. There's a few ain't so much gud'uns for sure, but some of them are mercs same as you."

"That doesn't give me confidence, Oswald."

"Well maybe it don't. But you're sure as hell just gonna have to deal with it. Same as they'll have to deal with you. We're all friends on this expedition. You… them… you're all gonna get on together like peas in a pod. Money makes strange bedfellows, Lawman."

 _It makes enemies is what it makes,_ Lawman thought to himself, but he'd got it now. He'd caught the bug. He was hooked and Oswald, _the dirty bastard,_ could see it in the gleam in his eyes. Lawman was in.

After some thought, Lawman leaned back in his chair and considered Oswald. "Let's just suppose now that I go ahead and accept this shindig of yours, Oswald. How we goin' to get to a place we know nothin' of?"

"The wanderer who found evidence of the motherload of data files, he'd found a vault further down the Mississippi. That's where you start. I've organised a boat. Pretty little thing; the Mayweather, they call her. It's a refurbished old world steam boat and she hums like a charm. Lawman, your first half of this expedition is goin' to be a cruise down to that research facility. That vault. And find clues that will lead you to the mother of all tech files. Failing that locate Lost Orleans by some other means."

"How much is this thing worth?"

"If black gold and uranium had a love child how much do you think it'd be worth? It's worth a lot, Lawman. A hell of a lot."

"And if we run into the Brotherhood of Steel?"

"Ah ha. That I leave to your discretion. I will of course wash my hands of any incident. I don't know you. Bad for business, you understand."

There were so many more questions, but only one more that Lawman asked. His hands itched for the liquor again, but his focus remained latched on the smoking silhouette of Oswald in front of him. "The wastelander – The one who found this evidence – where is he now?"

"Shot dead." Oswald's reply was blunt. "Find me the data file, Lawman. Pull it out of that swamp infested, overgrown hornet's nest of a graveyard and bring it back to me. Make us rich men. And make sure it don't fall into the wrong hands…"

…and the tendril of meandering smoke from Oswald's cigar rose up like the Mississippi to the ceiling, like a moonlit path to some question that for now would remain unanswered.

Oswald's eyes gleamed.


	2. Scene 2

Scene 2

The bar was a regular haunt in the post for travellers, merchants, mercs and all manner of travellers and destitutes. It was a dingy den of, well, not quite depravity, but certainly bawdry and rowdiness. There was always a hubbub with folk drinking their guts out and prostitutes on row outside to see them safely to bed and cashless the next morning. As Lawman entered, the doors swinging shut on the early morning mist behind him, a few heads turned. Over at a table in the darker corner of the bar where a cobweb of shadows flickered in the lantern light were sat a few hunched figures, brooding over their beers, dressed in an assortment of leather armour and scavver gear. Their eyes flashed over Lawman and although he didn't recognise them he felt damn sure that they recognised him. The only one of their group that didn't glance at Lawman was the one aiming and throwing his dagger at the dart board, and howling with laughter every time his opponent missed his mark.

"Ha! Better look next time old man…"

The others were clearly irritated by the posturing of this wiry figure with a gravelly voice. Lawman saw that the 'old man' he was playing against wasn't actually that old – in his late thirties at most. It seemed the wiry guy was an expert at winding up his competition and pushing their buttons, as though he willed them to fight him but always had his holstered gun on display as though to say 'Ah ah ah… Don't even think it…'

The only female at the table, her hair pulled back into a greasy wastelander's ponytail, rolled her eyes as she planted her boots on its surface.

"Carter!" she hollered, "when are you gonna stop playin' that fuckin' game and get over here. The guy's just arrived." She motioned in the direction of Lawman as she picked her teeth with a toothpick.

Lawman scanned the bar before stepping over, his hands rested easy on his belt but as always were not too far from his Colt 45, holstered at his side. He swung over and realised how they knew who he was – He was wearing his pip boy. Perhaps what Oswald had been saying about them wanting to steal it wasn't far off the mark…

"Hoo yah!" the man called Carter whooped. "Did ya see that? Bullseye. Dead on point. Hey woah, woah. Don't leave just yet. We only getting started, brother. I tell you what, double or nuthin'. How's that?"

"Carter!" the wastelander hollered once more.

Carter gave her a repugnant look. That was before Lawman's shrewd gaze picked up a devilish glint in his eye. Lawman would become accustomed to that devilish glint. It was the sort of spark that flickered in a void – a void of any emotion or repent. Whoever Carter was, whatever he'd done, Lawman felt sure that it was no damn good. Nothing this guy did was done for good. _Except hurtin' someone, he'd sure do_ that _for good._

"Or perhaps we make this more interestin'…" Carter said, in deadly soft tones. "How about it pardner? Care for a little wager?" he shoved the beleaguered 'old man' he'd been playing with in front of the dart board.

"Hold him down!" he barked to one of the men at the table. He did so reluctantly, not wishing for Carter's ire to turn on him, as the shocked man stammered and pleaded for Carter to stop. Carter just waved a hand as though to waft these 'silly suggestions' away. "Now if I get that bullseye just above your head, I get all your caps, you hear?" The man tried to pull away but in vain.

The others pulled away in disgust but didn't do anything. Lawman could read from their expressions that this was typical of the man they called Carter.

"Carter," the blonde, bearded man holding down the older one interrupted, "hey, look, there's no need for this a'right. He's just a…"

"You…" Carter drew his revolver, and Lawman felt his hand drift down to his own as a bead of sweat broke on his forehead. "…Shut up! You hear?"

"Like I said," Carter continued, turning to the man. Lawman's steady hand tentatively touched the handle of his Colt 45. "If I shoot bullseye, ya caps are mine. But if I miss, well then, I dunno… who's yer next of kin?" Carter cackled, and everyone in the bar was suddenly looking over.

Lawman bit his lip. Call it old habits from his Sherriff days, but he knew he couldn't let anything happen to the poor sod. His fingers slid further down the handle of his gun. _Besides, this lunatic is a liability…_

Carter did a little jig to loosen his muscles. Then he raised his gun and aimed, his eyes agleam with that murderous glint – no, not agleam, _aflame_. "On the count of three…"

"one."

Lawman clutched his gun.

"two."

Lawman was about to swing out his revolver.

"That'll be enough," came the voice as if from nowhere. Suddenly Carter's gun was knocked dextrously out of his hand by a walking cane, and sent spinning on the table. The others jolted out of its aim as it spun around, before it finally rested still.

"I think we can dispense with the parlour games," the suited man who'd struck at Carter's gun spoke with an authoritative air. The blonde man released the older one, who made a quick exit.

"Who the fuck are you?" Carter roared, grabbing the man by the shirt collar.

"My name…" the man said shifting his glasses slightly. They flashed. "…Is Mr Kees. I'm acting as Oswald L. Azazel's emissary in this mission. And I'd thank you to kindly release me from your grip." Lawman had to give it to the little fella, he was as cool as a cucumber.

Carter tried to hide his sneer from Mr Kees before he turned around, spotted Lawman's hand resting on his revolver, and paled. Carter fixed Lawman with an icy cold stare. His eyes were still sharp as two shards of ice as his face broke out into a glib grin.

"I guess they don't call you Lawman for nuthin', huh…Lawman?" Carter said in mocking tones.

"No. I guess not."

"You still think you're sheriff in these parts, Lawman?"

Lawman never shifted his gaze. "No. Not that Carter… It was Carter won't it?" Lawman didn't wait for a reply. "I just think your game won' all that sportin' now, was it? Now if you let the man stand there himself instead of being held down by the other fella, maybe it'd be a different matter…" He stepped over and poured himself a stiff one at the bar, and drank. "…but the way I see it you're just out to cause trouble. And besides," Lawman motioned to all the other occupants of the bar who were slowly turning back to their own interests, "we're supposed to be a private party. A secret little shindig between friends, am I right?"

"You sayin' I'm endangering the group. You think you're all hotshot all of a sudden?"

"Nah. That's just somethin' folks I meet tend to learn."

"The law is dead. Stillborn as a three headed Brahmin. I reckon that's a lesson you might learn from me. For free."

And the two locked eyes. The uneasy tension hung over them in the silence until it was broken by the wastelander.

"Carter, baby, sit your ass down already," she hollered, "Come sit next to me."

Carter looked venomous, but only for a fraction of a second, before he suddenly broke out into a glib and steely grin, throwing his arms either side of him as though to say to the world at large 'women, huh. Can't live with 'em and can't live without 'em'.

"I guess that was my bad, Lawman. Just tryin' to act big in front of a cool cat such as you."

He barked a laugh as he threw a pat onto Lawman's shoulder. Lawman brushed it off.

"Yeah," he said. "Don't mention it." _Talk about a Bonnie and Clyde duo he and the wastelander made. He'd keep his eyes on Carter… he'd have to keep his eyes on both of them._

Carter swung to the table and sat down next to the wastelander. He drew her in for a snog.

The man called Mr Kees cleared his throat as Carter retrieved his gun and holstered it. "Gentlemen," Mr Kees spoke in clipped English. "It is my pleasure to draw you all together in this quest under the direction and guidance of Mr. Oswald Azazel," he spoke in the tones of somethin' like an attorney. Such occupations exist in the west, of course, but over here in lawless territory, attorneys have about as much luck as sheriffs and fish in a desert. "I see most of you have already met each other. Nevertheless, for the benefit of those who have yet to make everyone's acquaintance, I shall formally introduce each of us to everyone else in the group before we begin…"

Lawman poured another drink at the bar and threw a few caps the shady-looking barkeeps way before he pulled himself up to the table. He needed a drink. His hands were getting the itch again.

" _Ahem_ …" Mr Kees continued. "This is Lawman. Who's also called…"

"No," Lawman interrupted. "No real names. Not from my end. You understand. I'm just Lawman."

"Right. He's a professional merc who takes scavenger missions for the Post."

"Bit old ain't he?" the blonde bearded one called out.

" _Experienced_. I've been gunslingin' since before you were sucklin' your mother's teat, Blondie," Lawman riposted to a nervous murmur of chuckles.

"He'll be the one to open the vault and to guide the scavenging mission through it," Mr Kees said. "Listen carefully to what he says once he's there. That goes to you too Carter…"

Carter scowled.

"You've already acquainted yourselves with Carter," Mr Kees continued. "He's a former raider and now works as a freelance mercenary. He and his men," and here Mr Kees motioned to Blondie and a darker haired gruff fella with a shoulder tattoo, "will be joining us as security."

 _Security?_ Lawman groaned inwardly. _What the hell are you thinking, Oswald…_ And yet, despite his gut wrenching and every fibre of his being telling him to leave this band of degenerates, he was still here wasn't he. The mission had sucked him in, not only to make sure the Post came to no harm, but because he was intrigued and he couldn't resist it no matter what he did. He found his hands itching at the prospect of riches as much as for the liquor in the palm of his hand. He gulped it down. _His new addiction…_

"The name of the Blonde chap," Mr Kees said, "is Leicester and our darker haired friend is Vyatch."

Vyatch grunted his greeting as he shifted, leaving his tattoo in a clearer light. It read 'Cazador'.

"Cazador," Lawman inquired, "What's that mean?"

"Who's askin'?"

"A guy who's interested in knowin'."

"It's the name of our group," the blondie Leicester called over. Lawman judged that it was he who was the most level headed out of the terrible trio. He probably didn't want to start a fight. Lawman wondered what drew him into a mercenary pack of cut-throats such as the ' _Cazadors'_.

"Thanks."

"This crew member," Mr Kees continued, "is Katherine…"

"But everyone calls me Lucky," the wastelander claimed.

"Why's that?"

"'Cause It's bad luck to have a woman on board. At least for all you assholes it might be," She jibed as she took a long swig of her beer. Carter grinned.

The crowd let out another nervous murmur of chuckles – all except for the last man at the table. He was a surly, grave looking fella whose gaze seemed focused intently on the drink in front of him that his big meaty hands cupped. He was, save for Lawman, perhaps the oldest of the group – late forties at least, and looked as though he'd seen many dangerous voyages. There was something else about him that Lawman's shrewd gaze picked up, a certain nervousness or general unease, as though he knew what lay ahead on this journey and wasn't remotely happy about it.

"…The Captain of the Mayweather, Vance," Mr Kees finished. The surly captain just nodded, his eyes latched onto his drink, as though it might be the last he ever had.

"Okay, so what's the story, Kees," Carter swung around in his chair to face him. "How's this gonna shake down? I want details."

"Mr Oswald Azazel has already gone over what our target is with each of you," Mr Kees shifted his glasses. "The general outline of the plan still stands. Vance will take us down the Mississippi on his fine vessel, the Mayweather, and somewhere down there will be our first mark – a vault, hopefully one with more info on how to reach our ultimate objective."

"After that," Vance interjected in wooden tones, "It's all your play…"

"But it were my understandin'," Katherine interjected, "that the fog there sends all compasses into nutsville. No one can make sense of where they are. What with the looming forests, the lakes and mires and the fog how are we gonna keep from walkin' in circles."

"Mr Azazel has procured a guide for this trip…"

"And where exactly is this guide?" Vyatch's gravelly voice rumbled over the assembled company. Lawman could tell from his look that the man was a stone cold killer.

"She's being…" and here Mr Kees seemed to be choosing his words carefully as he pushed his glasses up the rim of his nose, "… _fitted out._ In any case you don't have to concern yourself with guidance once we're there. We'll get through to her."

Lawman interjected suddenly, "'fitted out'? What the hell is this guide supposed to be? A Mr Handy, or somethin'?"

"No, Lawman," Mr Kees replied brusquely, as though to curtail the conversation at that point.

Lawman locked eyes with Mr Kees as he stood over the table. Mr Kees' face remained impassive.

"What in the goddamn is Oswald playing at?" Lawman asked gravely. "What do you mean, _'fitted out'_?"

"You'll find out soon enough."

"What about weapons? What do we need to blow up whatever god's little critters litter the wretched place?" Carter asked.

"Your usual munitions and armaments should do fine. A little extra firepower, for emergencies, wouldn't go amiss."

"Just make sure all munitions are packed within the cargo hold," Vance said. "I don't want to see a single live round rolling on deck unless it's strapped to your belt. Too many ships have been blown to kingdom come because they were overstocked on ammunition. No one endangers my ship, but me. Got it?"

"Does anyone have any further questions?" Mr Kees spoke again.

"How and when do we get paid?" Carter asked.

"When Mr Azazel receives his tech file, then you shall all be paid a share of the profits. Everyone's share is an equal divide. Your team for security, Lawman for scavving experience and vault access, the captain for his vessel, and lastly Oswald, for organising this whole endeavour."

"That's all I needed to know…" and here Carter looked at Lawman. The eerie lantern light danced on his face in such a way that Lawman couldn't make out his expression. It was inscrutable – lost in the shadow of misgivings.

"If that's all gentlemen," Mr Kees said, turning from the assembled company and motioning to the door, "then allow me finally introduce you to the Mayweather…"


	3. Scene 3

Scene 3

The mist rolled in from the river shore, casting the early morning settlement in a pearly glow under the moonlight. The Post was like any frontier town of the old west. The enigmatic fog hid its ramshackle huddle of houses and cabins under its veil, silhouettes slipping within the twilit dawn as the company moved from the bar, down the meandering dirt path, past the Brahmin pens and towards the east end of town. Slowly the sound of merrymaking and bawdry drifted into the pale silence as the bar slipped from sight, and the gentle currents of the Mississippi greeted their ears; waves lapping upon the silt shore and sloshing against the pier, its rickety wooden structure stretching out into the murky river beyond. The silver orb of the moon could just be made out through the mists in the sky above and a moangata lighted the waters in a shimmering glow, the silhouette of brooding dark willows haunting the space beyond its glittering light.

The company's footsteps echoed in the stillness as one by one their boots clapped against the wood of the pier. A faint and flickering light could just be seen through the fog peering out of the darkness. It was a lantern swinging from the makeshift crow's nest of an old and unlikely steam boat.

Lawman could see from a glance as he stepped tentatively forward that the ship had seen better days. Frankly, that was an understatement. The ship to Lawman's eyes was the equivalent of a three legged Brahmin to a caravaneer's gaze, and it looked like it was by sheer miracle that it was still afloat. That having been said there had been some work done to it. Its hull had been plated with steel and the bridge had been fortified with sandbags packed tightly around its base. For all that it was not big and not impressive. Seven people could fit on it sure – but only seven people.

Up close the white paint that coated the walls of the bridge was peeling, revealing woodrot. The crew silently paced on board and looked around.

"Well, gentlemen," Mr Kees said at last. "Welcome to your new home: The Mayweather."

They took it all in, their faces fading from anticipation as they approached to anything from shock to dismay as they stood on deck.

"You've gotta be kidding right?" Lawman asked as he slowly and pointedly peeled off a strip of dried paint. "The woods so bad even the woodworms are starvin'."

"No, Lawman, I'm not kidding." Mr Kees didn't seem to know how to respond to jokes or jibes. His lawyer-like air being the only state his personality ever seemed to be set in. "This is the ship that will take you to the Vault."

"It's a heap of junk!" The less diplomatic Carter exclaimed as he kicked in one of the creakier planks on deck.

"Oi!" Vance stormed over. "It may be a heap of junk but it's my heap of junk, a'right." Vance petted the railings of the ship reminiscently. "Me and old Mayweather go way back. Aye, she saw me through some tough storms back in the day…"

Carter balked at this as he flew over to Mr Kees. "You've gotta be shittin' me. You're shittin' us right?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"This thing is a floating piece of rotwood! What if a mirelurk attacks, or a fog crawler, or worse… hell, this thing doesn't look safe from a tadpole!"

"Carter, I can assure you that we have taken every precaution."

"Oh, yeah? Well what happens if a bunch of mirelurks attack, huh?"

"That's why we hired you." Mr kees gave a grim little smile to the speechless Carter as, to his credit, he patted the dumbfounded Carter on the shoulder and passed him by.

"What sort of captain has this as his ship," Katherine interjected.

Vance cackled. "The only damn captain willing to take you lunatics South, that's who," he wheezed. "What, is it not comfortable enough for you girls?" he addressed to the group at large. "My Mayweather not fit for the likes of you pretty landlubbers? Well tough tits!" And here he barked out a chorus of wheezing laughter. "'Cause I'm the only captain who agreed to have you lot on board and to sail so far downstream. Every other Captain shirked the chance to earn himself a share of that tech file's worth. So I guess you're stuck with me and my Mayweather, ain't ya."

With that and another chorus of wheezing laughs, Vance headed inside the bridge and out of sight.

"That guys crazy," Leicester murmured by Lawman's side. "We're being led to hell by a madman…"

"Well, we're the ones wantin' to go there, ain't we," Lawman said. "So by my reckonin' we're the ones two shakes short of an Atomic Cocktail."

Leicester shook his head as both he and Lawman stood watching where the Captain had just been.

"Not me. Never wanted to go on this journey. Not a chance."

"So why the hell are you on board?"

"Carter," Leicester replied solemnly. "He's the one who agreed to this. Me and Vyatch just follow his lead."

Lawman turned to Leicester and hushed his voice suddenly. "Why the hell do you follow that guy anyway?" he asked.

Leicester just kept on looking ahead, as though lost in thought. "Because there used to be another on our team, before he wanted to leave…"

"Well, what happened?"

"Carter let him go…"

Lawman arched an eyebrow.

"…off a cliff." Leicester contextualised.

"Ah."

"But why is this guy, Vance, the only one willin' to take us downstream?"

"It's not goin' downstream that is the problem," Mr Kees interrupted, striding over with his little walking cane clicking on the deck. "It's more about finding the right route through it past a certain point. The river down south ain't dead – the river is a snaking chain of bayous and mires that are living, breathing and continuously shifting within the brooding depths of the dark woods. There is one straight and true path to the vault and deviating from it even slightly means becoming lost; swamped within its dark forests and capricious waters. I anticipate that without Vance we'd, frankly, be fucked. Maybe it'll be good to us. Maybe it'll lead us where we want to go and maybe it won't, we don't know until we get going. That's why Vance is our Captain. He's the man most familiar with these ever-shifting waters with currents that yield to no man. He knows best out of anyone how to navigate them…"

"But he's never gone this far south before, has he?" Lawman replied shrewdly.

"No, he hasn't." Mr Kees shrugged as though this was of little relevance. "But he will get us there, believe me."

"He doesn't look like the sort of man happy to be on this trip, Kees."

"What makes you say that?"

"Call it a hunch."

"Well then, I guess that is all it is isn't it, Lawman."

Mr Kees turned around before clapping his hands together with relief, as two burly men dragged a figure with a coarse bag over her head on deck from through the mists. The ragged figure didn't writhe or squirm but just allowed herself to be manhandled on deck, where she was thrown to the ground.

"Gentlemen, Gentlemen…" Mr Kees greeted the men enthusiastically.

"What in the damn…" Lawman breathed as he approached the shivering figure sprawled on deck.

"…So wonderful you made it at last. And just in time too. We might have been setting off to depart but a few moments later."

"Where's our caps," one of the men grunted. "This wan't easy, Kees. We want extra for the collar."

The man drew back the hood covering the figures face and Lawman felt himself stagger back slightly in shock. Under the hood was a face like an old world starlet straight from the movie flicks, cut glass cheek bones, dark skin, molten brown eyes. But from her painted skin Lawman could see she was a tribal and not just any local tribal. This one was from the South – deep South.

She wore a bomb collar.

 _Where the hell did Oswald pull her from?_

"…gentlemen," Mr Kees carried on as though nothing had happened. "Your work has been remarkable, however a deal is a deal. If you'd like to amend it for on the job expenses then by all means contact my boss, Oswald. He'll be sure to _accommodate_ you." It was a sentence spoken with a dangerous edge, and the two burly men shifted uneasily in the small Mr Kees' gaze.

"Maybe we will talk with Oswald…" one of them balked.

"Maybe you will," mr kees replied coolly, with the full knowledge that they'd never dare make the same request to Oswald. Oswald wasn't the understanding sort.

"Come on let's get outta here…" one man said to another, and they shifted off deck with the agreed bag of caps in one of their hands.

"What is this, Kees," Lawman breathed, looking at the wretched woman curled up on deck, shivering.

"This, Lawman, is our key to opening the South up to our company. She's a guide. She'll show us the way through the forests once we're finished at the Vault, and will take us to New – I mean, _Lost_ Orleans."

"She knows where it is?" Lawman's voice was soft. Deadly.

"Her people speak of it in their tongue as a city where the dead do not sleep, and where people are taken by ghost like creatures, snatched in the night never to return. She's never been there but I have full confidence she knows where about it lies."

Lawman seethed. "Why's she wearing a bomb collar, Kees?"

"Unfortunately, our guide is not the willing sort. She doesn't seem to understand what we want out of this expedition and so…"

"…And so you forced her to become a part of it."

"It's business, Lawman. We need a guide."

"She's not a guide, she's a slave," Lawman spat.

"She's necessary. And so is the collar. She understands what _that_ means."

Lawman seized Kees by the shirt, lifting him to his scathing face. "Let her out of that thing. Now!"

Kees choked a little in Lawman's grasp. "You're not a sheriff, Lawman. And I hear that even when you were you were a lousy one. What was it your wife used to say, again? Before she was dead."

"You bastard!" Lawman raised his fist to strike the little man when suddenly he froze. He felt the tip of the icy cold barrel of a gun pressed against his temple. Lawman stiffened as his eyes turned to the side.

"Not that I care much for your argument one way or the other, gents," Vyatch's menacing voice rumbled over them, his gun already cocked and ready to splatter Lawman's brains all over the deck. "But I'd rather not have the guy who pays us get hurt, ya know what I mean?"

Slowly Lawman, relinquished his grip on the little man in the immaculate suit and the little walking cane that went _click-click_. Lawman's hands hung limply by his sides.

"Good, that's it," Vyatch rumbled. "Nice and easy. 'Cause that's what they used to call Lost Orleans, ain't it. We're all goin' to the Big Easy. And it's gonna be all nice and friendly like."

"Lawman, Lawman, Lawman," Mr Kees said despairingly, "when I said that Carter's men were here for security did you think that meant your security too?" Kees tutted and wagged a finger. "No. I'm afraid not. They're here for my security first and foremost."

"Oswald making slaves his business now, Kees. Is that it?"

"Oswald is a man of practicalities, Lawman. He doesn't let passions fray his reason. We need a guide. It gives us an edge that the competition don't have, and one that we sorely need. We don't have vertibirds, or power armour, Lawman. We don't have the resources of an entire burgeoning nation. We have seven people and a steamboat, but hopefully it's precisely that which will allow us to sneak in entirely unnoticed. Now, are we square? Or do we have to place you in a bomb collar too?"

Lawman was out of options. He'd go on this expedition one way or the other, as a free man or as a slave or else he was a dead man. They'd prise his pip boy from his cold dead body and continue without him – one less share of the treasure to worry about. _Christ_ , why was it only now he realised that Oswald had him by the balls. _Oswald had always had him by the balls_. And now he was fettered to this cruise whether he liked it or not.

The feeling began to dawn on Lawman, that he'd never see the Post again.


	4. Scene 4

Scene 4

A woman standing stock still, eyes aghast as she shouted, nothing but silence streaming from her cursed mouth –

The paddle wheels of the steamboat go round and round,

Round and round, round and round…

The child was only five years old. She was only five years old. You let her... She was just five and she... You let her…

"We're all goin' to the Big Easy. It's all gonna be easy, Lawman. We're all easy people and its gonna be real easy for you." Vyatch's voice was cold and soothing as he splattered Lawman's brains, the gun dancing like light on the river. "So easy."

Round and round and the girl rose up again, dredged up from the Mississippi like the living dead.

You let her... She was five years old and you let her...

Over to one side the woman mouthlessly worded impossible sentences that tied in knots and noosed Lawman's neck and sent him dangling from the gallows.

…die.

Lawman woke up, not with a start, but with a groan as a headache corkscrewed its way into his temple and flared every nerve ending. As far as hangovers go this one was in the top five. He rolled over in the bunk and two empty glass bottles of hooch fell and clanged on the iron grill floor. Another belt of pain coursed through his skull.

 _Jesus_ …

The nightmares were nothing new. Every morning he'd wake up in a cold sweat, his heart beating so fast he thought he might die.

The alcohol helped, kept his mind fuzzy and blurred enough that he might not be able to remember it. He often longed for sleep. The dreamless kind, the sort you normally get when you've drowned yourself under two bottles of liquor. It was the only reprieve he felt he got from his past. That and work. And _Lost Orleans._

That was a new dream that he'd been having lately. He'd been waking up, pale and sick, dreaming about a city enveloped by looming trees and dark forests, or submerged and consumed by lakes, or else ravaged by strange tribal folk. He dreamed of a city haunted by its past just as he was haunted by his. And although it was odd, he began to feel a kinship with the city. A crumbling, old relic belonging to an age consumed by one terrible war and then by the echoing silence that followed. He wondered how long that silence lasted in Lost Orleans – how long it had been since someone entered its grounds, trespassed upon the cracked concrete of the old world. He felt a feverish certainty that Lost Orleans would be saved from that silence soon enough. But he couldn't say whether it would be this team who'd be the ones to do it.

 _In her tongue Lost Orleans is the land where the dead do not sleep - Where ghost-like creatures steal away folk into the cold, dead of night never to be seen again._ Those were the words that the tribal guide had spilled about the place, more or less. It was a haunted city in the middle of nowhere. And that was where the greatest technological secrets of Vault Tec and the Old world lay dormant, for centuries. It was an old and crumbling eldritch gal, that city – but in that tech file it had one firecracker of an ace up its sleeve and now every man wanted it. Now every man would find themselves consumed by it.

He crawled out of the top bunk in boxers and shirt, and clutched his head in one hand as he lowered himself to the floor, recoiling slightly at the cold iron grill that greeted his feet. Through the fog of his mind he could hear the engine of the steamboat whirring as the paddle wheels spun around and churned the water in turn. The Mississippi lapped up against the side of the ship as it swayed softly and its prow gently cleaved its way through the waves.

Lawman got dressed before he ate some dried Gecko steak (tough as his own boots) and then entered on deck, making sure to strap his gun to his side beforehand.

It had been three days since they all started this journey. Vance had kept the Mayweather steady in the middle of the river for most of this time, only pulling closer to the shore to lay anchor and rest the night. It was a precaution used largely to keep a distance from possible ambushes by tribals, but even Lawman knew that had been unlikely because most of the tribals in the upstream territory weren't hostile. It was further downstream - no, scratch that - it was _now_ when they might run into trouble.

The days had been filled with dreary summer afternoons filled with card games and light gambling. Somehow Carter would always come out on top. When Lawman spotted a separate stack of cards that Carter kept close Lawman put two and two together and stopped gambling. He didn't make a scene. It wasn't worth it. His safety on this expedition was dangling by a thread – he could feel it, like the tension in the string of a bow. His relations with most of the crew were frayed at best. Leicester he got on well enough with, then there was Vance who seemed to always be preoccupied with something else and was as such indifferent to him. Then there was the rest of the 'Cazadors' – Katherine mostly ignored him, but Vyatch was like an alert coyote, watching for any misstep and Carter, well, Carter was the sort of person who'd try and make a misstep happen.

Kees was, and always would be, Kees – enigmatic, short, inscrutable and two steps from being the royal flush of bastardom. The guide, the gal who's name no one on this expedition knew, was silent as the grave, but strangely fierce in that silence. Kees spoke her tongue and it was he who would communicate with her once they'd landed at the vault, but until then the pleasure of his company would be something she could enjoy being without.

Lawman strode on deck, the sun piercing his eyes as the ship bathed in its light. Sure enough the fellas were huddled around playing cards again, Vance was up in the bridge and Kees was nowhere to be seen. Such was the normal play of the day. The guide was standing at the foot of the deck and Lawman imagined she might look like she wanted to leap off it, to plunge into the churning waters below. Lawman felt a burst of pity for the tribal turn slave, but when she turned to meet his gaze Lawman was slightly taken aback by the sternness and resolve that blazed in her eyes. She was silent. Silent but fierce.

"Care to join us for another game, Lawman?" Carter called over, all but certain that he and his spare deck would win. _Another day, another chance for Carter to start a fight with someone…_

"Maybe another time, Carter."

"Aw, come on now," Carter replied, not taking no for an answer. "Nothing to fear from a little game between friends, now am I right?"

The others, Leicester and Katherine chorused agreement. "You need at least four for a good game of Poker," Katherine said. "Gets pretty dull with just three."

 _Was she flirting with him?_

"Sadly, I don't have that many caps," Lawman replied. "Sorry." He didn't want to get involved with the wastelander, not even without the prospect of a sticky love triangle involved. She wan't his type and Lawman had the feeling she was the sort of gal a guy could do without. She had trouble written all over her, perhaps as much as Carter. Perhaps more.

"All the more reason for you to join us then," Leicester grinned at the prospect of some sane company. "win somethin' back."

"Any of you guys seen Kees?"

"Down in the cargo hold," Leicester replied.

"What's he doin' down there?"

"Search me…"

"And Vance is steering the ship?"

"Yeah, who else would it be?"

"Right." Lawman didn't stop to explain himself. He turned back around and entered the ship, clambering down the ladder that took him towards Vance's cabin.

 _It was time to do some digging…_

He stepped over to the door and looked both ways down the hall, checking the coast was clear, before peeking through the keyhole. No one was inside.

He had a strange feeling about Vance. Hell, he had a strange feeling about everyone on this expedition and no one more than Mr Kees, but Vance in particular drew Lawman's focus. For some reason the way the guy acted made his old sheriff instincts jangle. There was something off about the guy that Lawman couldn't place his finger on. It was as if the guy didn't want to be on the trip but, if he were here, then what was prompting him to be a part of it?

Lawman tried the handle. It was locked.

Well, he weren't a scavver for nothin'. Lawman drew out his lockpicking kit deftly from under his sleeve and began picking at the lock. It took a few attempts but eventually he got through and the door eased open to a well furbished, if small cabin. It was a decent dig compared to what the crew got, a cosy single bed with a desk by its side. A lamp was arched over the desk's surface and drawers ran along its length.

Lawman stepped inside.

It didn't take Lawman long before he found some letters hidden in a locked drawer. He rifled through them, searching for any clue, before his ears pricked at the sound of footsteps. Pocketing one at random he put the rest back in the drawer and briskly stepped out of the door. The door clicked closed behind him just as Vyatch turned the corner.

"What are you doing?" Vyatch asked. His eyes narrowed.

Lawman didn't hesitate. "I was just lookin' for you. Carter wants to fill out the card table with more players. You in?"

"Fuckin' Carter. You know he's cheatin' right?"

"Why do you think I'm not playin'?"

Lawman breathed a soft sigh of relief as Vyatch left for the deck. He quickly locked the door to Vance's cabin and stuffed the letter further down his pocket. He climbed back up the ladder and exited the Mayweather's claustrophobic interior.

He went on deck expecting to be called over for a game by Carter, or to be challenged by someone who'd overseen what he'd just done. He felt sure there was a sheen of icy sweat breaking out on his forehead – scavver work was still not his first port of call, and he wasn't used to the tension that ran with being sneaky. Put him in a gunfight and somehow, in a situation where rounds of lead ripped the air, he could be focused and collected, but in a situation where he had to rely on not being caught Lawman always felt uneasy. However, the company were, instead, gathered by the side of the ship, all staring off into the distance.

Lawman felt unease as he sensed the pall-like silence that weighed heavy under the stifling summer sun. He paced over, feet clapping on the deck, and his eyes drifted to what drew everyone's attention.

Over in the distance was an ascending column of oily black smoke. It rose into the air from within the forest, plumes of it cascading upwards. Lawman felt a sick feeling turn in his stomach.

"What do you think it is?" Katherine asked solemnly.

"How the fuck should I know?" Carter replied.

"Whatever it is, I feel pretty sure it's bad news…" Vyatch intoned.

"It could be useful to see what sort of wreckage caused it," Katherine said.

"Might be able to salvage somethin'."

Carter grinned as the nasty glint in his eye returned. He cast Lawman a glance. "Say, isn't salvage your department, Lawman?"

 _Damn!_

Lawman kept his cool. "You think Kees is gonna want to be distracted from our main mission for some oversized campfire? We're in hostile territory. This might well be commonplace."

"I've already told Vance to pull over the ship," Kees interjected as he stepped over as if from nowhere, his little stick click-clicking on deck. Lawman groaned inwardly. If anything spelled danger this was it. And they weren't even at the vault yet. "You'll be exploring whatever is causing the smoke, Lawman."

"Ha-ha. Good luck, old man." Carter whistled as he shook his head - A low whistle like the sound of a crashing missile.

"You'll be coming too, Carter," Kees said earnestly.

"Me?" Carter balked. "The hell for?"

"Protection," Kees replied. "What else?"

 _Perfect,_ Lawman thought bitterly. M _e, Carter and Kees alone together slap bang in the middle of hostile territory, which scarcely any man dare visit. Fuckin' perfect - An atomic dream come true._

As Vyatch and Carter prepared the rowboat that would take them to shore, and the paddle wheels of the steamboat slowly chugged to a standstill, Lawman made a glance at the letter he'd hastily stuffed in his pocket. It turned out to be a note from a doctor.

 _Well fuck me…_ he thought as he read through it.

Now he had an idea, at last, why Vance was a part of the expedition…

Vance had cancer.


	5. Scene 5

Scene 5

Vance had cancer.

The rust red Sun eased over the horizon, like a molten ball of lead sinking into a stream. It dashed and spilled its rays of dying light over the Bayou that both Lawman and Carter rowed to with mounting trepidation. It would have been a resplendent southern evening if it weren't for the distant cascades of oily black smog that scarred the sky, blotched out the rays and made to swallow the Sun, that vast molten ball of lead, as it sunk lower and lower in the sky, shadows elongating like talons from the brooding willows beyond and underneath that space, where god only knew what lay…

Where the stuff of hearsay and rumour lingered.

Vance had cancer and the fees were exorbitant. Immediately Lawman understood why he was on this voyage, he knew the gamble that Vance was being forced to make; all chips in, caps out on table, no second guesses, no take backs. All or nothing. All or oblivion. Lawman also knew who owned the doctors clinic: Oswald, _the slimy bastard._ He had his hooks in everyone on this voyage. Lawman was appealed to with his sheriff instincts to preserve the only scrap of civilisation clustered against a corner of the Mississippi; the Post. Then there was Vance who was being blackmailed with his own life into making this voyage. Leicester had to do what Carter told him to and the guide had a literal fucking bomb collar around her slender neck.

And just to be sure everything went smoothly Carter and Vyatch were on the company payroll, one a hot blooded sadist and the other a cold blooded killer. Lawman considered whether those two Cazadors were being coerced – maybe Carter was pushing Vyatch into it, but Lawman immediately dismissed this. No, they'd do it just for the money, along with Katherine. Just for the chance to get their hands to rest upon that tech and the wealth it promised.

 _As for Kees, what was his angle?_ Lawman's eyes rested on Kees as he sat with the guide at the prow of the boat. The dinky boat swayed as the gentle waves lapped up against the side. The journey was silent. No words exchanged, no good company to be had let alone good humour. Just cold anticipation of what lay ahead. Lawman wondered what was going through Kees' head. Was he really just as he seemed; a loyal and dutiful servant of Oswald who was only here to supervise a special interest, or was there more behind that inscrutable expression and those glasses that flashed in the sun's dying rays. Lawman could only wonder.

The prow of the rowing boat slid its way between the dark trees now, slipping under the shadow of their overhanging branches as the little boat carved its way into the bayou, moving over the surface of the water like a silken sleeve sliding over a dark mirror. A chorus of Radcrickets croaked, as though warning of whatever impending peril lay ahead. The silent company of four ignored them as Carter and Lawman rowed further, ploughed deeper into the currents, and the boat was enveloped by the shade of the overhanging branches.

They entered a dark and cool place where the air was close and the light that filtered through from through the branches and leaves was pale. It dappled the company with flickers of sunlight that reminded Lawman of the flickering of candles or the dying embers in a campfire. All that was missing was the warmth, which was replaced with the comparably chilly breeze that rolled in from deep within the belly of the bayou.

"We're almost there now…" Kees breathed within the silence. It was like a prayer, something to reassure them all as they rowed deeper. "…we're almost there."

"You smell that?" Lawman asked as he sniffed at the air as they rounded a tree protruding from within the fathomless waters.

"Smells like burning rubber," Carter grunted.

"No. something else. Something other than that."

"It's flesh," said Kees disinterestedly. "It's burning flesh."

Lawman and Carter both gazed at Kees with similar expressions of surprise. Kees looked at them.

"What? You think I don't know what burning flesh smells like?" He countered. He shifted his glasses and turned back to looking ahead. "Row on, gentlemen," he instructed.

They did and the silence descended again. The only sounds being the paddles as they broke the glass like surface of the water and Carter as he shifted his automatic rifle further up his shoulder. The smell was growing stronger, more pungent, as the boat crested at the shore of the bayou and the men disembarked along with the guide. The smoke was a haze through the air now, coiling chokingly around the trees ahead.

"Anything moves I'm gonna blast it to kingdom come, ain't that right Betsy," Carter said as he unslung his assault rifle and kissed it tenderly.

"You name your guns?" Lawman queried.

"You got a problem with that?"

"No. but you may want to keep it down."

"Oh? Why's that, sheriff."

"Because I don't want anything or anyone to know we're here. We slip in and we slip out." Lawman instructed. He was putting his foot down on this. "I don't like the look of things. This whole trip don't sit well with me."

"Well, I'm tellin' ya," Carter spoke up. "I'm not gonna wait for whatever may lie ahead to strike first. That shit ain't gonna fly."

"Carter, we need to…"

"Do as Lawman says, Carter," Kees interjected. Carter gave him a repugnant look. Kees took a step closer to Carter. "He's the scavver, Carter, not you. Don't make me repeat myself."

Carter spat to his side, his mood turning several shades darker, but Lawman knew he'd do as he was told. Oswald was right about one thing; to have everyone dancing to his tune this sure as hell was a slick operation.

Kees turned to Lawman. "After you," he said. "We'll follow your lead."

"Great," answered Lawman drily. "And the guide?" Lawman motioned to the de facto slave, whose wild eyes darted to the dark corners of the bayou – not out of fear Lawman shrewdly surmised, but as though searching for the earliest opportunity to escape. _Yeah, it's only a matter of time until enslaving a southern tribesgirl bites us all in the ass…_

"What about her?"

"Will she be followin'? Only it looks to me like she's looking for the best route to escape, Kees."

"She'll follow." And Kees drew out of his pocket a small mechanical device with a blinking red light and a trigger. It rested snugly in the palm of his hand. The tribesgirl's soft brown eyes latched onto it as her clammy hand slipped around the surface of her bomb collar. She gulped.

"Christ. You know how much of a bastard you are? You know this is gonna backfire on us, don' you? We're entering into her territory."

"Your moral quandary has been duly noted, Lawman," Kees' intoned. "Now get moving…"

They moved in single file, carving a way through the long grass, the marshes and through the looming trees. It wasn't long before the air was thick with smoke as they entered into a clearing.

"Holy mother of…" Carter murmured.

The space was a graveyard.

A litter of tombstones of tortured steel rose out of the ground. Stumps of twisted metal stuck out of the scorched earth like trees that failed to grow. Dented propeller blades were embedded in the ground as though they had been shot from an explosion, spewed forth and spat out of a crescent fireball – only the aftermath of which could now be seen in the remnants of what remained. The crashed vertibirds scarred the landscape, the familiar oily black smoke spewing forth from their blazing remains.

Lawman spotted charred corpses as he paced around the crash site, and power armour, scorched and bent, littered the field. Most men who survived the crash had evidently tumbled out of the wreckage burning to death – the ones who wore power armour were shot down, their armour torn to ribbons by some armour piercing round issued from god only knew what kinda gun.

Lawman hunched over one of the fallen soldiers in the breathless silence, he clasped his hand around the body's dog tags. It felt like he was trespassing in an empty graveyard, the place haunted by a strange quiet.

"Brotherhood of Steel," he read out load, his voice reverberating in the eerie silence. "Lance-Corporal Sawyer."

Lawman shook his head in sadness and not without a little fear for the safety of his own voyage. The Brotherhood were hardened soldiers – fanatical in their belief in prohibiting the use of technology and preserving humanity. _But Christ – they were shot down in droves_. How many vertibirds were there littered in this carnage? Six at least. And a chinook. So much for entering the South loud, proud and with guns blazing. The brotherhood always were a bunch of stubborn blockheaded fools.

Lawman spotted something in the dead soldier's hand. He leant over and prised its bony fingers apart and found an audio cassette. He picked it up, turned it over. It was mostly undamaged.

Lawman looked over to Carter and Kees. They both watched him without saying a word. He took the cassette, placed it in his pip boy, and pressed play.

The device whirred and clunked as suddenly the crackle of static infected the silence, its crackling resounding off the surrounding trees as though the noise came from them; a thousand hushed whispers spilling forth from the looming darkness…

"This is Lance-Corporal Sawyer… *static* …Yee haw! We've just entered southern territory boys! Can you smell that fine country air yet? …*crackle*… someone put on some old world tunes, I feel like celebrating…"

Lawman listened attentively as a catchy old world tune he recognised as 'You better watch yourself' by Little Walter blared aloud with the sound of trumpets. And for a creepy moment it was as though the rustling trees came alive…

" _You'd better watch yourself,_

 _Oh, you'd better watch yourself,_

' _cause I've got my eye on you…"_

"… _*static*…_ Lance-Corporal, turn off that fucking racket. I can't hear myself think back here…"

"…Sir, Paladin Salter, sir. Just trying to boost the men's morale, sir! …*static*…"

" _You've gotta watch yourself…"_

The music cut off suddenly and it felt, all of a sudden, as though the looming trees were still and listening. Or at least as though something or someone out there was listening…

As Lawman gazed out to the brooding trees his clammy hand rested on his revolver. A cold sweat glistened on his brow.

"…What did I tell you about playing music, soldier? *whir, clunk*…."

"…Sir, it won't happen again, sir…"

"….It better not or I'll report you to… *Crackle* … what the _fuck_ …"

Suddenly the sound of explosions, shattered glass and the sickening noise of wrenching steel blasted from the cassette.

"We're going down, I repeat, we're going down – holy sweet fuck!"

"All vertibirds down! I repeat, all vertibirds down…"

There was a tremendous thud as Lawman almost felt the vertibird crash into the dirt, only to be replaced by the crackle of laser fire and the heavy rattle of gunfire in the distance. Men's screams pierced the air as Lawman pictured them roasting alive.

"Retreat! Retreat!" The voice of Paladin Salter could just be made out in the distance. "To me! To me! Fall back this way! Bring the suit! The Chinese armour, bring it!" and then the cassette whirred and clunked into deathly silence.

Lawman sat still in the ghostly quiet, almost as though the sounds that had just visited upon everyone's ears were still playing over and over in their minds.

The guide muttered something dark under her breath in her mother tongue – some bastardisation of a pre-war Cajun dialect. Suddenly Mr Kees spun around and hit her across the cheek. The girl whirled, falling to the ground in shock, but as she glared up at Mr Kees her stare was as hard as ice.

"Hey!" Lawman burst forward, shoving Kees. "The fuck you playin' at, Kees."

"Ha ha ha…" Carter cackled. "Lawman, you got a hard on for the southerner, huh?"

Lawman ignored him. His glare bent on Kees.

"Are you going to hit me, Lawman?" It was a question asked almost as politely as though it were spoken at a dinner reception.

"You know damn well I'm not gonna hit you," Lawman seethed, "but you ain't gonna hit that girl again either."

"Trust me, Lawman, if you knew what she said you wouldn't be protecting her…"

"You won't hit her again." It wasn't a question. It wasn't even a demand. It was simply a statement of fact. An assertion.

Mr Kees looked down at the furious woman and simply lifted the trigger slightly. The guide flinched. "No, Lawman, I don't think I'll need to," The little man said in foreboding tones.

Kees brushed past him and walked across the clearing. The others grudgingly followed him after a while. Their footsteps crunching in the ash and soot. Kees had stopped at some mighty footprints that trod their way hastily in a southward direction, away and into the trees, through them and beyond, out of sight.

Mr Kees turned to the guide and spoke a few words in her language. She hesitated before answering him. Carter and Lawman looked on non-plussed.

"Interesting…" Kees said to himself enigmatically after the guide had finished. She glowered at him as his gaze followed the trail into the looming darkness beyond. "Very interesting…"

"You gonna tell us what the fuck she said, Kees?" Carter retorted.

"I asked her where the footprints are headed."

"And…"

"She says that beyond this place, if they kept going in a southerly direction, they'd chance upon a tribe of dangerous individuals who live on the edge of the 'habitable zone'. Beyond that is a dead town whose name time has forgotten and that squats as silent as a tomb by the waters of the Bayou. Beyond, still further than that, deeper south still, well…"

"Well what?"

"The footprints of the survivors are headed to a place she refers to as Terror Bones Parish, where demons hidden from the eye lurk amidst the trees and swirling mists, ensnare passers-by and tear human flesh from bone and devour it."

"Yeah," Carter spat, "when we headed there?"

"Hopefully never," Kees replied drily, "I never put much stock in tribal stories and folktales – but something tells me whatever lies there really is dangerous."

The tribeswoman shook her head and muttered a few more desperate words.

"How the fuck you come to speak her language anyway?" Lawman asked.

"Oh that's easy," said Kees. "I'm a Southerner myself. And you know something, Lawman? I started off as a slave too – until I worked my way up to where I am now."

"Bullshit."

"Believe me or don't. I don't care, Lawman. But it's true. I was a slave for one of the Post's more local tribes, captured from the Deep South and made to work the land. I have the lashes across my back to prove it.

"Oswald was the one who bought me from them. He set me free. Not the law. Not a sheriff. But Oswald. Don't get me wrong, he didn't do it out of kindness. He saw potential in me. And I owe him my life. The guide will be set free, Lawman…. _Eventually_. But first she _will_ go with us to the vault and she _will_ guide us through the perils that lurk ahead. After our hands firmly rest upon the tech file, and assuming she's still alive, then there is no longer any need to keep her in bondage. She will then be permitted her freedom.

"All things have their price, Lawman…"

The sun sank lower, the shadows grew longer, and the darkness grew deeper.

" _It's just business_."

Soon they would set off back the way they came, reach the rowing boat again and report back to the Mayweather. But before that they all stood, back to the blazing carnage, gazing into the darkness that lay south, and wondered.

They all looked deeper into the shadows creeping amongst the trees and Lawman found himself wondering what hell waited for them…

…and what hellish fate had come to greet Paladin Salter.


	6. Scene 6

Scene 6

It appeared a clear night with the stars strewn overhead like the mirror reflection of a past when cities lighted the entire world in brash neon, or like the light dancing off the dew glistening on a spider's web. Lawman's gaze was caught by it as he sat huddled in the crow's nest, wrapped up in thick layers of Bighorn hides and blankets so that only his face peeked through the top, exposed to the bracing wind. It was his turn to keep watch out for ambushes or hazards up ahead and Lawman should have had his eyes focused solely on the river and the trees, only every time he looked down at the Mississippi he saw the stars and moon reflected in its shimmering surface and he found himself gazing back up at the sky and wondering about a time when the old world cities were alive and flashed like beacons back up at those stars. Mankind had created a second night sky once, as though it had bottled the stars in every city and strewn them across the Earth – such was the power of oil and uranium fever. Such was the power of old world technology.

There was just enough of that tech left, in the dying embers of the old world, for mankind to fight and wage war over. Where once light burned in those cities, now the dying embers of the old world burned only in the barrel of guns – like the ones that had shot down the brotherhood vertibirds and chewed their armour into ribbons. Lawman could still hear that audio cassette playing, could still hear the men's screams as they burned, and the song, the damned song. _You'd better watch yourself alright, no finer words then them were ever spoken in these parts…_

Lawman shifted slightly as he drew the hides and blanket closer around him, tucked up and warm against the chill air. _God, he needed a drink,_ he thought as he moved under the sheets, _just a small one, to warm his spirits and take his mind off the carnage._ Lawman could feel the odds for their survival on this expedition drawing longer and longer, like a shadow at sundown. Whoever attacked the brotherhood had some serious firepower and Lawman had no idea what to make of that – the brotherhood were rivals after all, serious contenders and dangerous opponents seeking the same thing that they sought. Yet, the devil they all knew was shot down and massacred by a devil they didn't know, and that put everyone on edge. They all knew the brotherhood, what they wanted, what they were capable of, but the mysterious devil that brought them down? They knew nothing of who they were, what they were capable of or even what they wanted. Were they another rival group after the tech? Were they tribals? But then, Lawman never knew tribals to have that sort of firepower – where would locals of the area find that sort of armament? All these questions whirled in Lawman's mind like a roulette wheel, spinning round and round, red for trouble and black for death and all bets hitched on the little square of green that was double zero – that was the elusive tech file and whatever secrets of the old world it encapsulated.

Lawman turned to his trusty pip-boy and gazed at its dimly gleaming screen. He didn't have the cassette no more. He had thrown it away into the undergrowth, back when they'd travelled back to the ship. It felt wretched, cursed somehow, and Lawman didn't want to hang on to it. He could feel his skin crawl when he'd had a hold of it. However, Lawman had been scanning through the frequencies on the pip-boys in built radio. When they first started the journey he could still tune in to the radio station at the post, filled with dreary reports on Brahmin caravan routes, tribal movements and likely ambush spots. It was designed to help facilitate trade through the area, to help convoys evade hazards. Now though those reports had faded into a sea of static, slowly at first, then abruptly. One day the crackle of static engulfed the radio and nothing more was to be heard, and it felt at the time like they had all suddenly been cast out at sea, miles and miles from shore. It was strange but Lawman had clung to that radio broadcast like a last lifeline. He knew eventually that it would disappear the deeper south they went but that didn't stop him from being surprised when it finally did lapse into quiet.

Lawman scrolled through the frequencies, hearing the static jump and jive but not yielding to any broadcast. All was quiet down south. And that was strange. It appeared that their hidden foe had the technology to take down the Brotherhood but didn't make radio broadcasts to each other.

Lawman looked up for a second and then did a double take on the horizon ahead. There was something like a great white wall of white advancing along the river towards the prow of the ship. A great mist swirled from the skies and rolled in along the waves of the river, enveloping everything in a silvery shroud, as opaque as looking through a cracked sniper scope.

"Shit…" Lawman breathed as he threw off the blankets, bracing himself to the chilling wind, and clambered down from the crow's nest to the deck. He scarpered hurriedly to the bridge just as the mist rolled in, the first tendrils slinking along the waves and enveloping the Mayweather. Lawman's Geiger counter jittered as he swung the door of the bridge closed behind him and approached the surly back of Vance as he steered the Mayweather at its control panel, staring fixedly ahead through the dusty windows at the gloom advancing steadily upon them.

"Vance," Lawman huffed. _Shit, one climb down from the crow's nest and a quick dart to the bridge had knocked the breath out of him?_ Lawman came painfully aware of just how unfit he was. Well hell, he was fifty odd after all.

He took his time to catch his breath but Vance already knew what he was going to say.

"Don't worry, Lawman. All prepared for," he spoke without even turning around.

"What do you mean?"

But before Lawman could get his answer, Vance had flicked a few switches and great beams of light flashed from the lights set upon the prow and sheared through the fog ahead. It was only enough to see maybe thirty or forty feet infront of them but it was enough. Vance turned down the ships engine to a soft hum as the paddle wheels slowed and the ship glided forth, smoother, slower and more cautiously than before.

"You didn't think I hadn't foreseen this fog did ya," Vance said. He slurred his words slightly as though he'd been drinking. Although with Vance you could never quite tell whether that was the case or whether it was just his natural surly drawl.

Lawman looked exasperated as he collapsed into a seat. "I didn't know what to think honestly."

"You knew this mist was going to happen, Lawman. You was told back at the inn remember."

"Ah shit. You know what, you're right. It completely slipped my mind. One minute I was distracted, then the next this great big mist was rollin' in. What was I supposed to do?"

"What you just did," Vance replied. He grasped under the control panel for a moment and retrieved a bottle of liquor without once taking his eyes from the river ahead. "Some liquid courage, Lawman?"

 _Ah,_ Lawman thought, _So he had been drinking._

Lawman was never one to turn down a drink. "Sure, why not."

Vance passed the bottle to Lawman who took a quick swig. Then he took a longer one for good measure. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it."

"Sure you should be drinking whilst steering this thing?"

"This _thing_ has a name."

"Right. Sure you should be steering the Mayweather whilst drinking?"

"Never did me no harm before," Vance replied and then with a dark grin continued, "Heh. Where you're goin' you're gonna need some of the strong stuff."

"You mean where we're goin?"

"We? What 'we'? I ain't goin' where you're goin'. I'm goin' down the river that's all. Just a lovely river journey to the heart o' darkness. Made it many times before, but you lot? Going to that vault and then to god knows where. Heh, heh. Good luck is all I can say."

"What should we expect?"

"How should I know? The river always changes, always shifts and turns like a great python. I can tell you which currents to take and which to avoid, I can navigate our way so far downstream but stepping foot on land? I ain't never been so foolhardy to do that. If you ask me you lot are doomed," Vance wheezed into a spluttering series of coughs.

"We all need to survive if we're to get our share of the Tech file's worth, Vance."

"You think I care about money?"

"I think you care about fixin' your cancer, Vance."

Vance was quiet for a sobering moment.

"So it was you who took that letter," he said gravely. "I shoulda known it'd be the fucking scavver."

"Oswald has got his hooks in plenty of people on this voyage. You ain't alone. Trust me."

"Huh. You think Oswald has his hooks on old Vance do ya?"

"He's the one that owns the doctors clinic back at the post. I'm just putting two and two together here but I'm guessing he sold you this expedition as your only ticket to affording the treatment you need."

"So what if he did?"

"So I'm guessing you ain't too happy about that."

"What does it matter? This is the only hand I've been dealt. It's either this or drinking my guts out awaiting the inevitable." Vance took a swig of the hooch and although he swayed slightly, the steering wheel remained steady in his hand. "Besides," Vance consoled himself, "This is the only work I've ever done. The only thing I've ever been good at. I'm the best damn captain there is in these waters and Oswald knows that – Oswald appreciates that. If I had to die then it would be on this river."

"If I had to die it'd be in my bed, making love to an old world starlet, but I guess that's aiming a bit high, huh?"

Vance grunted a laugh. "Yeah, maybe that'd be fine too," he said. "Still things being what they are I know what my choice is."

"You don't expect to survive this expedition, do you?"

"No."

"Why not – you said yourself you think we're doomed if we set off on land, that implies you think staying on the ship will lengthen your odds of survival."

"It will lengthen my odds of not meeting with any nasties before I choke of natural causes. Trust me, you ain't seen nothin' o' what happens to people down here. I've seen bodies. Mutilations. And god only knows what caused them. What I've seen…

"…you ever seen a man's skin peeled straight off his body – as though it had been chewed off by something with mandibles? Well, I have. And it aint pretty. And you wan' a win an easy bet you bet that I ain't never setting foot on land."

Lawman couldn't help noticing, in the faint reflection of the bridge window, his skin had turned a pale white. A bead of cold sweat ran down his brow.

"But there are people who live in these parts. People who inhabit this hornets nest of a place."

"Aye. And they ain't nothin' you wanna run into neither. Nature like this," Vance waved his hand signalling the mists, the silhouettes of warped willows and the churning waves of the Mississippi, "turns men into beasts. Believe me. There's somethin' here that saps at a man's soul. Something that sucks the life out of your bones. I can sense it. Have always sensed it. It's grown stronger now, more than it had been before."

"We have the guide. She can, at least, show us how to survive." Lawman said those words, just catching himself as he felt a treacherous feeling of appreciation for Oswald bringing her along. _She's been made into a slave, damn it! It's wrong, it's all wrong…_

"That guide right there is your biggest liability," Vance slurred. "No one on this expedition wants us all dead as much as her, and we're setting foot into her territory. No matter how she's been fitted out with that bomb collar, she's the one you need to watch out for most. Not Carter or that Vyatch bastard – those assholes kill for pleasure. She'll kill you not because she wants to but because she needs to. There's wildness in her. Have you seen it? In her eyes…"

"Yeah, I've seen it. I told Kees we should free her."

"Free her? Hah. We should blow her head sky high now and be done with it."

Lawman shook his head. "She ain't done nothin' to us, Vance. We can't just kill someone because we think they're gonna hurt someone."

"Why not? You almost did yourself."

"What? You've got your marbles knocked off kilter there, Vance. I think the drink has gone and addled your brain."

"Back at the inn, way back at the post, you were gonna gun down Carter before he shot that man down."

"That was different."

"Different how? You saw he was gonna cause harm and you were about to put a stop to it."

"I was about to put the gun to his head and tell him to cool it."

"You think he woulda listened?"

Lawman just shrugged, but he knew the answer. It was the answer he didn't like.

"I'll tell you what I think, Lawman." Vance replied. "I think he would have turned on you and tried to gun you down before you could think to pull the trigger. He's faster than you. I've seen him work his guns. It's like watching lightning strike. Fast. Accurate. Deadly. You… Well, you've got a conscience that gets in the way."

"And hooch to clear it." Lawman took the bottle and pulled another swig.

"And you're older too."

Lawman just nodded his head at that glumly. "Yeah, maybe. But I got some fight in me yet." He looked out the window as he took another swig. "I got some fight in me yet…"

Suddenly, there was a deep thundersome grinding noise emanating from deep within the ship's hull. A shuddering almost knocked the bottle out of Lawman's hand.

"What was that?" Lawman called out.

"Shit!" Vance exclaimed as he spun the wheel and steered the ship to the side. "We're too close to shore . Brushed up against some rocks."

"We okay?"

"Sure we are. We're going too slowly to cause any real damage. This is where the journey gets real exciting."

Suddenly there was an almighty yelp. Feet clapped on the stairs down below as people stormed up on deck. Lawman looked out over the ensuing scene and felt his white fist clench.

"You bitch, you fuckin' bitch!" Carter raged as he dragged the wailing guide out of the hatch by her hair. "You're gonna fuckin' die!"


	7. Scene 7

Scene 7

"You wretched piece of tribal filth!" Carter screamed as he hurled the guide by her collar to the floor. "You think you can draw blood from me, you shit?"

"Carter, what the hell is going on here?" Kees stepped on deck, his cane clicking on its surface as he rapidly made his way to intervene.

"The bitch is gonna pay! That's whats happening, Kees."

He began beating her, furiously, his fists drawing blood where he pommelled her beautiful face.

"Stop him," Kees called to the other Cazadors who were clustered anxiously around the scene. They hesitated, eyes darting from Carter to Kees. Vyatch made a point of shoving his gun further into his holster.

"Did you fucking hear me?" Kees seethed. "Fucking stop this madness now."

However the group of mercs were obviously split on whether to do as Kees instructed or whether to stick with Carter. Katherine turned to one side and muttered, "Fuck's sake…" as the guide wailed.

"That guide is of the utmost importance to this expedition," Kees informed, drawing a steadying intake of breath to calm himself. "Harming her unnecessarily is detrimental to our objectives. So will you lower your fists, you goddamned philistine!"

Carter turned.

"Or what are you gonna do, Kees?" He rested his hand on the handle of his revolver as he stepped towards Kees. "My men aren't stupid enough to turn on me. You may be the one dishing out the coin at the end of this trip, but I ain't smelled none of it yet and as far as I'm concerned that means I'm not yours to give orders to."

"You know the terms of your contract with Oswald, Carter."

Carter cackled. "You're the only son of a bitch who'd draw a piece of paper at a gunfight, Kees. Did you hear me? My men do as I say. I will shoot and kill anything that stands in our way but that don't make you my boss, Kees."

Carter pulled up to Kees and overshadowed him with menace. Kees could smell the tobacco that the vicious son of a bitch had been chewing on moments before. There was blood dribbling down Carter's chin from a gash on his lip.

Kees tried a different tack. "What do you want, Carter? You want to kill our best chance of survival on this expedition?"

"I want to hurt her, like she hurt me…"

"The hell she do to you, Carter?" It was Lawman. He strutted up to them, the mist swirling around his silhouette as the lone flash of a lit cigarette illuminated his face.

"She bit my lip."

"She must have been real hungry." Lawman's voice was low and deadly despite the beguiling wit.

Carter sneered. "You must be angry, Lawman. Seeing as I got there first."

"You got where first?"

"All the bases."

Lawman said nothing, but his face turned white with cold anger as he seized his cigarette in his fist and crunched it up, scarcely feeling it burn his palm. He dropped it, smouldering, to the deck.

"Draw, you sick twisted animal."

"Lawman, step back. That's an order," Kees intervened, stepping between the two gunslingers.

"What did you fuckin' say to me?" Carter hissed.

"You know what I said," Lawman seethed. "It's what will be written on your gravestone."

"Lawman!" Kees barked. "I require you both to stop this now. Carter, stand down!"

Carter just shoved Kees out of the way however. There was nothing between Carter and Lawman now.

They both drew. A single shot resounded through the night.

There was blood everywhere.


	8. Scene 8

Scene 8

Both Carter and Lawman had heard the shot.

They stood guns drawn, stock still, each aiming square at the other's heart, but the overriding emotion wasn't anger anymore. They didn't feel the cold fury that had ensnared them moments before. Instead their eyes were locked, but they expressed nothing but confusion – puzzlement.

 _Neither of them had pulled the trigger._

Their guns lowered slightly as they both looked to where everyone else's shocked gaze had turned. Their eyes widened with terror. They saw Kees, his knees trembling, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water gulping for air, and blood – streams of blood spilling forth from his gut, soaking the once immaculate white suit he was wearing.

With one shuddering gasp Mr Kees, that enigmatic bastard of a man, crumpled to the deck and lay motionless. The crowd stood disbelieving at the dead man and the pool of blood that spread out from him. Lawman didn't know why but he could suddenly hear the song playing in his head, the same one that had haunted the slaughter ground of so many Brotherhood soldiers. _You'd better watch yourself…_

" _AMBUSH_!"

Leicester had scarcely bellowed the warning when a hail of bullets ripped the air like silk. In the distance the flash of firing guns flickered like mourning candles from deep within the shadowy willows beyond the mist. Everyone dived for the deck as splinters of wood blasted into the air.

Carter crawled hastily over to Leicester as everyone else kept their heads down, yanking the blonde merc to face him. "Get the guns! Inside the hull! Get them now, you flaccid prick!"

Leicester darted for the hatch.

Three seconds. That was the window of time it took for Lawman to see Leicester's face transform. One moment he saw him scrambling to his feet and darting to the hatch, Leicester's face wearing a look of wild eyed fear. The next moment that face was ripped into by a stray bullet, the contents of his head blasted behind him like streamers of blood and flesh.

Leicester's body flopped to the floor.

"Shit! Shit! Shit!" Carter exclaimed as he lunged for the hatch, and almost fell through it, clanging into the corridor below. He raced for his weapons.

Lawman, Vyatch and Katherine had drawn their revolvers and began firing into the bushes and trees the other side, returning fire at shadows and silhouettes dancing amidst the mist and gun smoke. They tried aiming for the little sparks of gunfire, those flashes spitting death from the other side of the river.

"Where's Vance?" Katherine shouted over the thunder of gunfire.

"He's where he always is – at the helm!" Lawman shouted back.

"Well, someone should tell him to steer a course away from this place!"

"I'm on it!"

Lawman crawled along the deck before racing up to the helm. He burst through the door and into a room that was now littered with shards of broken glass from the shattered windows. He spotted Vance hunched at the steering wheel.

"Vance, I hope you're getting us outta here!" Lawman bellowed.

Vance made no reply. He simply focused on steering the ship and muttering the same prayer over and over. It was clear that he was doing his best to steer the ship out of harm's way but…

"Can't you go faster?" Lawman shouted. He flung himself down behind a wall as another round of fire thudded into the ship, splinters and shattered glass streaming over him.

"Faster?" Vance yelled back. "Do you want to crash? Do you want to become lodged against the rocks? Do you want to make us sitting ducks?"

"Go faster, Vance!"

"Are you mad? I can scarcely peer over the top of the wheel!"

"Do you think we have a choice right now? How long will the Mayweather hold against this barrage?"

"The Mayweather's withstood worse than this, mark my words! You want me to go faster than you're gonna have to get Kees to give the order himself!"

"Kees is dead, Vance."

"What?"

"Go faster!"

With that Lawman scurried back through the hailstorm of fire to the others. Carter was at the hatch trying to clamber out, a number of automatic rifles slung across his back along with a rucksack of ammunition, but hadn't the opportunity as the enemy's fire seemed to focus in on him.

"Carter, we need the grenades!" Vyatch bellowed.

"Cover me and you'll fuckin' get them!"

"We're doing the best we can, but without grenades to stun them we can't create an opening."

"Well then you're fucked aren't ya!"

Lawman looked over at Kees' corpse, his white suit stained red with blood and the little walking cane he used rolling on deck, the tip of it still clicked against the deck – almost as though you could hear his ghost pacing up and down. Lawman thought that was what they might all be soon. Lawman's Geiger counter on his pip boy click-clicked as his heart hammered in his chest. His gun almost slipped out of his hand as he kept firing, reloading and firing again, his hands were so clammy. He looked over to the guide sprawled on deck, not dead but unconscious from her beating. Lawman got an idea.

They needed a grenade, and he knew just where to get it.

He crawled over to Kees and, with the thunderstorm of bullets and ammunition flying overhead, he grunted as he turned over the body. Kees' eyes stared glassily up at nothing, strangely dim and lifeless. Lawman rummaged in his pockets. He soon found the detonator switch to the collar and shortly afterwards found the most important item – the keys to the bomb collar.

He scrambled over to the unconscious guide and seized upon her bomb collar with his sweaty hands. They slipped on its surface as he tried to press the key into the slot, his jittering hands messing up his efforts. _Christ, here he was doing his best to survive and keep everyone alive and here were his hands just wishing they had a fucking drink…_

He pushed the key into the keyhole at last and twisted it. It clicked as the thing sprang open and released the guide.

"The fuck do you think you're doing!" Vyatch bellowed. He beat Lawman across the jaw with his elbow sending Lawman tumbling over the guide. Lawman lay sprawled on the deck for a few moments, gathering his wits, when Vyatch thundered towards him again, on all fours like an animal. Vyatch's hands seized around Lawman's neck. Lawman swung the bomb collar around and clonked him on the side of the head. Vyatch toppled over, unconscious.

"I'm getting the grenade, you dumb bastard," Lawman breathed hoarsely.

Lawman didn't waste another second as he saw Carter still struggling to get out of the hatch, Katherine still firing at shadows in the distance and Vance steering the ship as fast as he dared away from the shoreline.

Lawman threw the bomb collar dead centre into the lights of the firing guns.

He pressed down on the trigger and immediately there was a flash. That was the most surprising thing. There was no sound. No sound but the ringing in Lawman's ears now as he pressed his hands to his ears. A pillar of earth and dirt rose into the air from where it fell as a tree was uprooted and capsized into the river. The gunfire had stopped and Carter clambered out of the hatch wielding a grenade launcher.

Carter fired a dozen rounds into the forest all whilst screaming, "How'd you like me now, bitches?" Each one shook the Earth as it exploded and eventually cleared out the trees, sending them crashing to the ground. It wasn't until a minute or so later that he stopped, pressed his back against the railing of the ship and waited for return fire.

There was none.

All was deathly silent.

Lawman didn't know who it had been that had ambushed them but he felt certain that it couldn't have been the same people who'd shot down the Brotherhood of Steel. If it were they wouldn't be alive right now. No. This felt more like a raiding party and yet the question surfaced, in Lawman's adrenaline filled mind, as to where on earth a set of raiding tribals would find working guns down south. Guns preserved from the pre-war period were aged things prone to break and yet Lawman could tell from the sound alone that these guns made that they were new.

Whatever the answer was Lawman didn't give it another thought for now. His body needed to rest. He made to get up.

"Where do you think you're going, partner?" Carter's voice felt as though it had slammed into his gut like a concrete block. Before Lawman could do anything he crashed to the floor as Carter pommelled him with the butt of his grenade launcher.

Everything faded to black.


	9. Scene 9

Scene 9

Lawman heard the screams as they reverberated from the past. He heard the child crying out his name. He heard the gunfire and knew in his heart of hearts that he could do nothing as sheriff to save either of them. Then there was a city. A city with flashing neon lights, its streets awash and brimming with that brash swirl of colour that trickled throughout every avenue, and flooded the sidewalks of every road. Lawman could hear the drum-drumming of the jazz music hanging in the close and stifling southern air. Its syncopated beat spiralled into chaos as slowly the neon lights spat and sparked into flames, and New Orleans was consumed by nuclear fire. Willows grew, darkness lurked, neon lights flickered and pirouetted within the shadows of twisting alleyways. And always within this graveyard, this desolated playground of opulence, there was a secret. There was a secret and it called to him. It called to Lawman.

His skin was sweaty and sickly pale as slowly Lawman stirred from the same nightmare he had every night. The one with the woman and the child was always the same, forever recurring, always traumatic. Only drink helped to stimmy his nerves on that one. However the appendage to that, the dream of a city with a secret – that was recurring sure, but it was also expanding. It expanded each time he dreamt it, revealing something new each time, as though he strode just a little bit further down its streets, as though his line of sight stretched just a little bit further towards seeing something he didn't like. Something that could only be left unspoken each time Lawman awoke, as he scrambled as many of his memories of the dream back together as he could, only to find he'd forgotten most of it. Either way, Lawman could not tell if it was auspicious to have these dreams or whether it was portentous. For that reason he had kept these thoughts to himself, locked away in his mind from the rest of the crew.

 _Well_ , he thought to himself bitterly, _whatever's left of the crew now can go fuck itself_. He looked up and saw his hands bound to a steel pipe somewhere in the ship's boiler room. _Yeah, they can seriously go fuck themselves._

He looked across from him and saw the southern guide watching him with her dark eyes. She'd been watching Lawman sleep he soon realised and he wondered what she was thinking. She was tied up herself; to another pipe opposite Lawman. This one was beside one of the main boilers. She didn't struggle against her bonds but just watched Lawman with a furrowed brow.

"Yeah, you're welcome," Lawman told her as he motioned to her neck, the tender skin where her bomb collar had once clasped so tightly. "Must have felt like a bitch while that collar was clapped like irons around your throat."

The guide simply looked back at him. She tilted her head.

"I freed you," Lawman repeated slowly for her to understand. "Comprende? You're welcome. Not that it matters of course, judging by our current habitation and all."

There was no response. There were just those dark eyes looking back at him.

"Not very talkative are ya?"

Nothing.

Of course there was no response, Lawman knew she didn't speak the same tongue he spoke. Still he thought some sort of gesture or something might be received from her.

"I'm sorry about what happened to you. About all of this. Thought I might make somethin' right by challenging Carter, but it looks like I just made things worse, as usual. Damned be the sheriff in me, I just can't let things be."

There were a few moments of silence where Lawman looked about himself. He still had his pip-boy, although with his hands bound he had no way of operating it as just yet. He did not however feel the weight of his revolver in the holster by his hip. He had been searched and stripped of any weapons and (for that matter) his lock picking equipment. He could no longer feel that down his sleeve either. Well it looked like Carter actually knew what he was doing. But then of course he would. Tying up prisoners was probably only one step down his list of top attributes from shooting said prisoners in the head.

"Well, I dunno about you, but I sure as hell could use a drink right about now."

No response.

"At least if I had a drink I wouldn't have to face my death sober."

Lawman was nervous. And when he was nervous he wanted to drink or else to talk, and seeing as there wasn't a drop of alcohol available to sate his thirst he would be damned if a little thing like language stopped him from talking to the guide. He hadn't been killed. Not yet anyway. He was about to speak again when his ears suddenly pricked at a sound emanating from beyond the boiler room.

A slow and sharp clapping noise made its way to the door of the boiler room like someone clapping in mock applause at Lawman's predicament. It took a while before Lawman recognised that the clapping was the sound of footsteps upon the metal grill floor.

Lawman waited patiently as his adversary unbolted the door and strode into the room, picking up a crate and using it as a seat as he sat down in front of Lawman. Carter sat, a shadow veiling half his face, as Lawman glared back at his cruel stare.

Carter drew a pack of cigars out of his pocket, took one out and placed it between his yellowed teeth. He lit it and took a long inhale of its sweet aroma. When he exhaled a familiar blue haze lingered. "You know," he said, relishing the cigar as its fumes coiled from his mouth and rose upwards to the ceiling, "say what you like about Kees, but he sure hid some fine cigars from the rest of us."

"They're Oswald's," Lawman replied. He recognised the sickly sweet scent all the way back from when he was sat with him at the post. Back when he had a cold glass of hooch clasped in his hands. Lawman felt cold sweat percolate upon his forehead.

"Are they? Huh, the fancy rich bastard sure has taste."

He puffed some more on the cigar and Lawman watched its stub smoulder in the shadows like a blood moon. Carter unleashed plumes of smoke into the air.

"You gonna let me loose out of these bonds? I'm not much use tied up." Lawman spoke confidently as he stared directly into Carter's cold dead eyes.

Carter grinned and let out a couple of snickers. He lowered the smouldering cigar by his lap and leant in closer.

"What makes you so sure I ain't gonna kill you, Lawman."

"I'm not dead yet am I? I don't have a bullet rattling around the inside of my head. You're still interested in the tech file, ain't that right?"

"Yeah. I'm interested In the tech." He pulled another draft from the cigar and savoured its delicious fumes. "I'm interested in the money I'm gonna get once I lay my hands on it."

"You need me."

"No," Carter sneered. "I need your Pip-boy."

"You need the man who knows how to use it. The only man on this trip that fits that criteria is me, Carter."

"Yeah, maybe your right."

"So. You gonna hurry and let me loose? My arms are getting' tired."

"Why the hell would I do that, Lawman. I need you alive, but I don't need you comfortable. When we get to the vault, then we'll see. Maybe by then I'll figure how to work that damned pip-boy of yours."

"And my gun?"

"You really think I'm gonna give you back your gun?" Carter leered through the haze of cigar smoke. "You're a scavver, Lawman. Last time I checked you don't need a gun for scavvin'."

"What about the guide?"

"What about her?"

"You really gonna keep her cooped up in here, Carter."

"You have any better ideas, partner," Carter sneered. "Someone got rid of her bomb collar. Did ya hear?"

"Let her go."

Carter laughed. "Let her go? So she can do what exactly? Shoot us in the back? No, she's still of use to me," he growled. "I need her to guide us all through this…this fuckin' overgrown graveyard of a place. She don't need to speak to be able to do that, she don't need a tongue, she just needs a finger to point. With enough encouragement she can be made to understand the gist of what I'm sayin'."

"Okay. Let's suppose she takes you to Lost Orleans. Let's suppose she leads you there and the treasure is within your grasp. What then, Carter."

"I reckon we play a round Russian roulette with her as the sole player." Carter grinned. "I always did like parlour games."

"You're gonna kill her? What incentive has she got to help you then?"

"Oh you'd be surprised what people can be made to do, Lawman. As for you, you'll help us or you will refuse. In which case we'll start cutting off fingers. Or better yet we'll cut off _her_ fingers. I know how fond you are of the girl, for some reason. And if you try to escape I'll just gun you down before you can get five feet away. You know how fast a draw I am.

"Yeah. I need you Lawman. And you'll soon realise just how sorry to hear that you should be."

And with that Carter put out the cigar on the iron grill floor and paced to the door, the sound of his footsteps clanging on the floor. They reverberated in the compact boiler room like the words he'd shared moments before.

He turned back one last time.

"You know what this is?" he said as he lifted up a clunky electronic device from within the depths of his satchel.

Lawman said nothing.

"It was Mr Kees'. Apparently as soon as we captured the tech file he was gonna use this to contact Oswald. He was gonna give away our location and escape with the tech on a private vertibird with him, leaving us high and dry. Funny how things turn out, isn't it. Now I'm the leader of this expedition I guess things really have changed. Trouble is I reckon there's only so much room on that vertibird, Lawman. And I think you're gonna have to get real chummy with the guide and her people quick because you're gonna spend a lot of time down south…

"…Just a little thought for you."

And with that he exited the boiler room. And Lawman was left with the guide and the shadows and the dying embers of that cigar as its meandering fumes slowly rose like the Mississippi; like a moonlit road to a question that Lawman dreaded the answer of.

 _How the fuck was he gonna get out of this?_


	10. Scene 10

Scene 10

The last few days saw Lawman drifting in and out of a dreamless sleep with scarcely any food to satisfy his growing hunger. His mouth was parched as the stifling heat from the boilers made him dizzy and woozy. He couldn't remember the last time he'd eaten a meal. His face had grown gaunt and pale, with scarcely a drop of sweat dripping from his brow because he couldn't spare the water he'd been starved of. His body drooped from the pipes he was chained to, like a crucified man strung to the cross by those Legion bastards.

Now he opened his eyes blearily, and gazed across at his only companion, the ever silent, seemingly always distrustful, southern guide. Her face too was drawn and pallid, but those eyes still burned with the same secretive determination as before, it seemed.

Lawman's arms ached from being bound to the steel pipe. He had tried loosening them time and time again, yet his bonds only ever grew tighter with each struggle. The girl opposite him didin't try at all. Not once. She simply waited patiently. Deep down Lawman and the guide alike knew they weren't going to be killed just yet. They would be kept alive just. And so the guide did the sensible thing and conserved her strength. Lawman however spent the first day hollering for them to let him go. He bargained as much as he could until his voice ran hoarse and lapsed into silence.

When the boiler seemed to gurgle to a sizzling stop and the boat suddenly lulled into a slow halt, Lawman thought for a few frantic seconds that they were about to sink. It was only when Vyatch strode into the room and made towards him with a waterskin in hand that Lawman realised he was wrong. And as Vyatch pushed the waterskin to his cracked lips and the fresh water began to pour down his parched throat, Lawman felt a new dread rear itself from deep within his gut. Vyatch grunted something as Lawman busily chugged down the water but he didn't listen. He knew intuitively what this meant. They'd roughly approximated the vault's location and now they needed him to work his magic.

Lawman felt Vyatch pull the waterskin back before he could drink it all. Lawman managed to gasp one word: "More…"

"Later," Vyatch growled. He undid the bonds that bound Lawman to the pipe above his head and Lawman felt his arms tumble by his side as though they were the arms of a limp rag doll. He slowly began to massage the feeling back into them, finding it hard to lift the one with the pip boy. It was one of those strange sensations where Lawman tried to move his arm up but instead would send it swaying to the sides, unable to properly coordinate his movement.

Vyatch stuffed Lawman's palm with something. Lawman looked down. It was a roasted squirrel.

"Eat," Vyatch grunted once more.

"Where's the vault at?" Lawman asked as his mouth salivated at the odour of cooked meat.

"Just eat."

Lawman didn't need telling twice. He gobbled the little critter, teeth yanking at every bit of roast meat he could tear off of the bones. Vyatch made his way to the guide.

"Hey," Vyatch spoke to her like a prison guard to a roughed up inmate. "You know why I fed him first?" He motioned to Lawman with his thumb.

There was no answer. Lawman couldn't see her expression. Vyatch's squatting form was in the way. But he imagined she was scowling defiantly.

"I fed him first so that you'd see the food and water isn't poisoned, you see? Now, I know you don't speak our language an' all but I reckon you're more savvy than what you let on, so listen up and pray you get the gist of what I'm sayin' because I'm only gonna say this once. I don't care what you've been through, I don't care what happens to you out there. You've got one chance. You do what Carter and I tell you, and who knows, maybe you'll make it outta here alive. You screw us over in any way, any way at all, and you ain't gonna live. You understand?"

Lawman couldn't see if she responded or not but Vyatch lifted the waterskin to her lips and Lawman heard her gulp it down greedily.

"That's right," Vyatch intoned. "We're gonna get on like peas in a pod, that's right."

He untied her bonds too as Lawman gnawed ravenously at his roasted squirrel. She grasped at the roast meat that was handed to her and devoured it.

Lawman could feel his empty stomach filling with the meat's juices and his head became clearer with every second. His vision stopped blurring as he stumbled unsteadily to his feet.

"Ah ah ah. Not a step further," Katherine's voice called out. Lawman looked to the door and saw her there, leant on the frame with pistol in hand, lazily aimed at Lawman's chest. "You done feeding them, Vyatch?"

"There fed."

"I don't suppose dessert's on the menu…" Lawman interjected drily.

"Ha ha. Good. I was worried you might lose your sense of humour, Lawman. I've missed it so over the past few days." She gave a wry smile. "Come on, Vyatch. Let's get them moving. We've got work to do."

"Hey listen, I've not had a drop of alcohol for days. S'there any chance you could spare a drop." Lawman persisted as Vyatch shoved him to the stairs out of the boiler room.

"Lawman, honey, you know a joke ain't half as funny when it's spoken twice. Get moving!" Came Katherine's sharp reply.

"I'm serious. If you want me performing at my best then you need my hands to stop shaking. I need something to steady my nerves."

Something sharp pierced Lawman's arm. He bolted around so fast he almost surprised himself as he found Vyatch holding the guilty needle in his hand.

"What the fuck!" Lawman yelled. He almost shoved Vyatch away from him only for Vyatch to shove him down to the floor, one arm crossed over his neck so that Lawman struggled to breathe.

"Relax, Lawman." Vyatch turned the syringe around so that the struggling Lawman could see it properly. "Med-X. See?"

Vyatch relinquished his grip and left Lawman spluttering on the floor. He felt so weak. So weak from hunger and thirst that his attempts at struggling out of Vyatch's vice like grip had felt utterly futile. This wasn't good. Despite that he did feel the effects of the Med-x taking affect. His hands stopped their normal tremble but it didn't feel as satisfying as an ice cold whisky sliding down his throat, that was for sure.

"Feelin' better now, Lawman? Get up!" She gave Lawman a sharp kick in the ribs that made Lawman clutch at them in pain. He quickly got to his feet before her boot could connect again.

Lawman, despite the pain shooting from his ribs, looked her directly in the eye. He could already feel the pain subsiding, even though a bruise began to swell there. "I need my gear," he said sternly. His eyes bored into hers. "I need my lock picking gear. And my gun."

Katherine leant into Lawman's austere face and playfully gnashed her teeth. She grinned as Lawman recoiled slightly, but not taking his eyes away from hers. "Oh baby, when you look at me like that I could just gobble you all up, you know that?" She leered with a lust as cute as razor-wire. "The gun is a no go, hon'. But we've kept your lock picking equipment all safe and cosy for you. It's yours just as soon as you need it."

She spun around and her wastelander's ponytail flailed in Lawman's face. "Vyatch," she called back, "get them up on deck. Carter wants to see them as soon as possible."

"I'm already workin' on it," Vyatch called back, and immediately he shoved the guide in front of Lawman, right before Lawman felt a cold circle of metal press into the small of his back. The gun's cold metal barrel pressed uncomfortably against his spine. "Look lively, Prince Charming," Vyatch sneered. "We've got a Vault to clear."

They ambled up the cold, grid-iron stairs out of the boiler room and into the corridor. It wasn't long before they'd each climbed the ladder at the opposite end and scrambled out to face the blisteringly hot and blinding Sun for the first time in days. The heat from the suns fiery hot rays hit Lawman full in the face as he felt himself wade through the sweltering air. Despite him being barely hydrated he felt streams of sweat drip from under his arms and stain his shirt.

His eyes took a few moments to adjust to the blinding light before he saw the silhouette of Carter leaning against the railing of the Mayweather, facing them with folded arms.

"Carter, honey, we're all set to go." Katherine swung her way over to him as Carter fixed Lawman with a cruel and steady gaze. Katherine swung her arms around him and they plunged into a fiery kiss, his stare only being taken off Lawman for the briefest of seconds. He still continued to watch him intensely while their lips locked.

Carter slowly pushed her off him as he swung over the railing of the steamboat and lowered himself into the rowboat, which swayed slightly in the deceptively gentle waves of the Bayou.

Lawman looked around, for the first time since his eyes had adjusted, and found himself surrounded by overhanging branches of warped willows and towering, twisted trees that made the swamp their home. God only knew where they'd actually come from because Lawman couldn't see from here where the open river was. There was only row upon row of trees and the murky water that pooled around them.

Lawman remembered once when he'd scavenged in one of the old world cities of the Midwest, before he met Oswald and was still Sheriff of a small band of survivors. It had been further up the river Mississippi in a place they used to call St. Louis. Lawman remembered what folks used to call the Gateway Arch, and how it loomed over the waters like a portal to heaven. Lawman didn't find heaven that day. He'd gone scavenging with a family, deep within the confines of a riverside mall. He remembered how hollow it felt, how empty and desolate it was, and how dark it had been. He remembered hearing noises somewhere in the darkness when he and the family had already entered so deep into the labyrinth of aisles. He remembered how he'd drawn his gun, told the others to keep quiet in hushed tones that were still too loud in the vast echo chamber they were in, and he remembered how he stalked past the aisles, one by one, passing each with a hawk-like eye scanning for traps, his pulse beating whilst he waited, waited in the darkness, for an ambush that might never come. He remembered the kid, no older than ten, and the pip-boy strapped to the boy's arm and how it glowed so brightly, like a pale green beacon, giving away their position. Lawman remembered how he had wished that pip-boy was on one of his bare arms, so that he could switch the damn thing off before everything went wrong. But he was too late, and everything did go wrong.

Lawman, felt that time creep back up on him now as he stared at his pip-boy, and felt the heavy burden it bore. He felt just the same as he'd felt back in those times. But, instead of looking down one eerie aisle after another he was stood at the precipice, looking down row upon row of foreboding trees that blotted out most of the sky up ahead and left only flickers of sunlight to glitter upon the dark waters. He saw the mist entangle itself between the trees and knot itself within the dense foliage, concealing what lay ahead like the darkness between those aisles. He heard the pip-boy click repeatedly at the surrounding radiation, it's pale glow swallowed by the intense light of the blinding sun, at least until they entered under the trees, when it would once again be a pale green beacon in the encroaching darkness.

Lawman felt sick.

Already the South had proven itself full of hidden dangers. How many more times would they roll the dice? How much more was the heart of darkness hiding?

Katherine pointed the pistol Lawman's way and waved for him to hurry it up. "Get moving, Lawman. We don't want to wait until nightfall."

As Lawman moved over to the side of the ship, he saw Vance walk up to Katherine. He didn't glance once at Lawman. He exchanged a few words with her, seemingly arguing about something. "…What if something should happen to my Mayweather? What then?"

"We need someone to play look out whilst we're in the vault." Lawman heard Katherine answer. "If you can't find a way to park your ship closer to it, then I guess you're shit outta luck."

"Why not someone else? Get someone else to watch for intruders! Me and my Mayweather have fulfilled our end of the deal. I just gotta wait here for you to return, at which point I'm out!"

"The deal's changed, Vance." It was Carter. "Get on board before I shoot your ass." He called up from the rowing boat, and as Lawman lowered himself over the edge of the ship and into the little boat he noticed his colt 45 tucked in one of Carter's holsters. _Mother fucker…_ Lawman thought as he sat himself down. He also noticed a host of other weapons tied around Carter's belt, including a large hunting knife.

"What you think you're looking at?" Carter intoned, meeting Lawman's gaze. Lawman stared back but said nothing.

"I know what you're thinking, Lawman. But the only time you're gonna see this gun out of its holster is within the same breath as one of its bullets caving in your head. We clear?"

"You always have had a persuasive way with words, Carter," Lawman replied drily. "S'posing I need it to defend myself against whatever lurks out there?"

"Then I guess you're as good as fish food, ain't ya."

Vance lowered himself unsteadily into the rowboat, not without a lot of grumbling, Lawman noticed. The old sailor seemed to curse Carter under his breath in a creative number of ways.

Next in the boat was the guide. She sat silently, but Lawman could see that she was as alert and sharp as a coyote hooked on mentats. Lawman found himself admiring her endurance after all she'd been through. The person who followed was Katherine who dropped gracefully between Carter and Lawman, and then lastly, and not so gracefully, Vyatch seated himself at the end overlooking them all.

"No, no. Vyatch get the guide to sit next to Lawman," Carter commanded. "I want to see exactly where your hands are," he said, turning to Lawman. "That's why the two of you are gonna be rowing us there. Vance, which way?"

Lawman's stomach did a turn as Vance pointed directly into the darkness ahead.

"The Mayweather's honing system detected an underground complex that way," he mumbled as his gnarled finger quivered a little. The path ahead was an aisle of trees whose twisted, angular branches bowed over each other to form what to Lawman's mind looked like the open jaws of some beast, the thorns forming rows upon rows of sharp fangs like a shark, all leading down, down and further down into the cavernous inky blackness that lay beyond, and the pearly mist that glided over the waters like a spectre. Then Lawman reminded himself that how he was feeling now was nothing compared to how Vance must be feeling. Vance knew of people who'd disappeared in the Bayou, people who'd been sacrificed to the Bayou in nightmarish ways.

Carter simply leered.

"Alright, Lawman." He cocked his revolver and pointed it directly at Lawman's chest. "Get rowin'."


	11. Scene 11

**Scene 11**

The boat slid silently over the dark waters of the Bayou, plunging itself further into the darkness cast by the looming trees. The thin, wiry branches of the willows hung over them like pale streamers and brushed against the company as they passed, making it feel like Lawman was rowing through curtain after curtain of leaves deeper into a mist that sent his pip-boy's Geiger meter crackling.

Lawman left his pip-boy light on. He was confident that the pale green light wouldn't be able to be seen from too far away within this dark forest. At the same time it was the only thing that lit their way just a few feet ahead of them. Shadows flickered and danced over the company's faces as Lawman rowed. His Colt 45 was still in the tight grasp of Carter, and it was still pointed directly at his chest. Its barrel gleamed.

Lawman never would have thought that he'd ever miss Mr Kees, but he sure as heck missed his company now. Mr Kees may have been a bastard in his own right, and their ain't nothing that can redeem the man for doing Oswald's dirty work, but when he'd been in control the group felt more secure from itself. He had been just about the only person who could keep Carter and his Cazador's in check. Now, however, there was nothing stopping Carter and his crew from doing what they wanted – to him and to anyone else in the group. Hell, he even missed Leicester. He had at least been the most reasonable member of the Cazador crew, and he was significantly less likely to want to shoot you in the head if he lost a game of cards. Lawman had never spoken much to the guy but when he had passed the time with him he'd always been – _what's the word?_ – civil.

He'd almost forgotten that word.

"You sure this is the right way, Vance," Carter intoned, his gruff voice breaking the silence.

Vance just nodded without even locking eyes with Carter. He sat crouched, looking into the distance, biting down pensively on his thumb nail. His thoughts were far away from everyone at the moment. He looked anxious.

"Vance! Are we travellin' the right way?" Carter burst out impatiently.

"Yes," Vance snapped back. "We're goin' the way the honing system told us to go. It detected tunnels over this way." He resumed his far away gaze. "Never in all my years have I ever left my Mayweather unguarded in hostile territory. Never…" he mumbled.

"How do you know it didn't just pick up some mole rat tunnels or somethin'?" Carter retorted, not dropping the subject.

"Oswald fitted the honing system to my ship 'specially for this mission, Carter. And let me tell ya, if it _is_ mole rats, they sure are big ones to make a tunnel of that size. And I mean _big_. Talking about the size of several bighorners. So, yes, Carter, I'm pretty sure that it's a Vault."

Carter grunted his approval. "Good," he said. "Because I'm getting sick of this place. Too many fuckin' trees. Can't get a sight on anythin' that might be crawlin' around here."

"Maybe there ain't nothin' to watch out for, baby," Katherine soothed. "If somethin' were to attack us it would have done so by now…"

Vance barked a nervous laugh and grinned to himself for a few moments. The Cazador's turned to look at him.

He returned their gaze. "There is always something to look out for in these woods. It'll most likely see you before you see it. I said before that this was a suicide mission. The best chance you have is to turn back now and hope you don' disturb nothin'."

Carter turned the revolver on Vance. "Shut up. Or my gun will disturb the inside of your head."

After Carter turned his gun back to pointing at Lawman and a period of silence passed, Vyatch leant forward and spoke in hushed tones; "There is somethin' here."

"You heard somethin'?" Carter replied with the calmness of a hunter with his prey caught in the sight off his gun. He didn't turn around to meet Vyatch's gaze. He simply kept watching Lawman.

"I've seen somethin'." With that Vyatch tapped Carter's shoulder and pointed towards something that looked like an overgrown spider's web spanned between two trees in the distance. Lawman gazed at it and it took some time before he recognized that it wasn't a spider's web at all. It was rope that had been woven and tangled together. Caught within it were dirty feathers and skulls that missed their lower jaw so that it gave the impression of some creepy dream catcher.

As the boat glided past it, Lawman could see recognition flash in the guide's eyes.

"Hey," Carter called, snapping his fingers at the guide. "Hey, you. What the fuck is that? What does that mean?" He pointed to the totem as it shrunk into the distance.

The guide made no reply. She just returned Carter's gaze with an expressionless one of her own.

Vyatch grasped her arm and twisted it. She yelped in pain. Lawman felt his anger rise from the pit of his stomach.

"We know you understand. Tell us what it means, now!" Vyatch twisted harder.

The guide struggled feebly against Vyatch's vice like grip. He twisted harder still.

"Fuckin' bitch," Carter exclaimed exasperatedly as Katherine simply grinned maliciously. She playfully stroked Carter's upper arm. Carter, once again tried asking her. He pointed vigorously to the totem and made to shrug his shoulders as though motioning the question. "What is that?" he asked again, impatiently.

The guide reeled off a string of insensible words in her mother tongue. There was one that sounded very much like 'danger'.

"Danger?" Carter repeated irritably.

The guide nodded and motioned to turn back.

Carter grinned. "Well lookie here, Vance." Carter whistled. "It looks like we got ourselves another scaredy cat who wants to run on home." Carter laughed. Then he looked directly into the guide's eyes and slowly shook his head. "No," he mouthed.

Vyatch released his grip on her and she returned Carter's grinning face with a vehement stare.

Lawman kept quiet, but underneath his cool visage he was seething inside. Call him old fashioned, but hurting young women regardless of where they came from was to him reprehensible. As sheriff he had seen and dealt with abusive husbands and partners too often. He hated it as much then as he did now. But he couldn't do nothing but bite down on his lip. He locked his eyes on the gleaming barrel of his gun. Carter's bite was worse than his bark…

All of a sudden the boat shook as it hit a protruding root. Carter was surprised for a moment, his balance almost thrown, and Lawman sensed that he had inadvertently created a narrow opportunity for him to seize back his gun. If only he had planned it ahead of time he might have seized the opportunity before Carter righted himself and swung the gun back to pointing at Lawman's chest.

"Easy there, Lawman," Carter hissed in dangerous tones. "I don't want to have to shoot you before we reach the Vault. I need you to open it for me. So do me a favour and refrain from any suicidal thoughts of trying to steal your gun back, because whatever plans you're cooking up in that head of yours, Lawman, they won't end well for you."

Lawman said nothing as he returned Carter's hard stare.

It was some time later that the trees ahead thinned out and the darkness retreated. Bloatflies could be seen circling some distance away. As the boat reached a marshy shore Carter trained Lawman's gun on the idling bloatflies, his hand steady as he focused on them like a hunter. Carter knew he could kill them all with one round, that he could shoot so quick, that his reflexes were so fast that each of the bloatflies would hit the ground within the same second. But even Carter knew that there were worse thing lurking in this forest and he didn't want to attract the attention of something nastier. He withdrew the revolver and pointed it back Lawman's way.

Carter turned those hunter eyes on Lawman and there was a moment of heightened unease as they locked eyes.

"Age before beauty," Carter intoned and motioned with his gun for Lawman to get out of the boat and lead the group. Lawman, not taking his eyes off Carter for a second, lowered himself into the knee high waters before wading to the shoreline and hauling himself up with the help of an exposed root. He clambered onto firm ground before looking back to see the others following suit. They all reached shore when Carter turned back to Vance.

"Now what?" Carter asked.

"We head over there," Vance replied warily, directing the group with a gnarled finger. "There should be some buildings up ahead. The honing system detected a large opening in the ground near one of them."

"Right. Lawman, get moving."

"Any particular reason why I'm first?" Lawman replied as he apprehensively scanned the path ahead with wary eyes. "I always thought the leader should, well… _lead_ , Carter."

"Oh, but we all know you're the scavver, partner. You're the one who detects traps, finds and avoids hazards and ambushes, and knows how to find what we're looking for. What use would you be followin' behind?" Carter rebuked.

"It's hard to do all that while a gun's poking in your back."

"Too bad. Move."

Lawman didn't turn around again. He turned reluctantly to the path ahead, took a steadying breath as he absorbed every detail, and began moving ahead in unchartered territory. Sure he'd explored places he'd never been to before in the past, but…this felt different. This wasn't the charred ruins of St. Louis or some half flooded river settlement belonging to one of the Mississippi tribes. This was the South. And Lawman knew that none of the dangers that he had been through before could prepare him for what lay ahead.

He began pacing slowly forwards, stepping tentatively over exposed roots towards the pale light of evening that filtered through in the distance up ahead. He picked up a stick and used it to both cut through the grass ahead and to prod the ground, checking for quicksand and hidden tar pits. Honestly, he didn't know what he was doing half as well as the guide might. All Lawman could do was hope there weren't any creatures hiding in the long grass they all waded through.

Eventually, they entered a clearing, clambering out of the edge of the forest into the dying light of day and coming upon what remained of a small twilit town. The sky overhead was dominated by looming thunderheads and the houses were overtaken by foliage that grew over them in the fading light and almost hid them from sight. They were camouflaged by something like moss and some wall climbing plants that spanned over the brickwork and glinting windows. The roads were cracked, with roots crumbling the asphalt. Scrambled and knotted they spread over the road's entire surface.

One thing that wasn't covered in fungus and plant-life was the sign by the road that lead into town. A strange silence emanated from the place as Lawman slowly paced up to it. He could see that it wasn't a metal sign like so many other ones that had been reclaimed by nature, but was in fact more reminiscent of a man-size headstone that jutted out of the ground; a pile of stones cemented together into a steep pyramid.

A bronze plaque on it read 'Welcome to Sunshine: The Homeplace of Giles Wolstencroft, Assistant Chief Executive Officer of Vault-Tec. May you have a Sunshiney Day!' Lawman brushed away some moss growing over the bottom half of the plaque and saw the Vault-Tec logo with an engraved picture of Vault Tec residents underneath. They were depicted waving as they 'cheered' and 'smiled', holding up the Louisiana state flag. The moss, however, had eaten away at the plaque somewhat and what should have been cheery residents looked instead like captives frantically waving for help, their smiles were warped to look manic and their cheery grins were smeared to look like screaming faces caught for all eternity underneath the Vault Tec Logo that hung above them like the Sun, or like an all seeing eye. Lawman stepped away from the disturbing image.

"This is the place," Lawman spoke gravely. "No doubt about that."

"Who the fuck is Giles Wolstencroft?" Vyatch rumbled from behind Lawman's shoulder.

"Some kind of Vault Tec hotshot, apparently. Can't tell you more than that," Lawman replied.

"Well, whoever the fuck he was, he ain't nobody now but bone dust," Katherine said dismissively. "Come on, we've got a vault to find."

"Where do you want to start?" Lawman asked. "In a town like this it might be like searching for a needle in a haystack. And it's getting dark." Lawman looked to the sinking sun and felt a shiver of trepidation.

"Vance," Carter called without turning to face him. "Where to from here?"

"I don't know. All I know is its someplace in this town next to a building."

"Christ, I thought that honing system told you where it was?"

"To a point it does."

"Alright, Lawman. You're up."

"Wait. Me? I don't have any better idea than Vance. How do you expect me to find it?"

"Isn't that what you're supposed to be paid for?" Katherine riposted.

"Really? You're giving me too much credit…"

"What about you're pip-boy?" Carter snapped.

"What about it?"

"Doesn't it have some sort of…I dunno… Vault detector or somethin'?"

"You've gotta be kidding me."

"If Kees were here he'd know what to do," Vance said, looking warily around at the shrinking sun and the encroaching darkness.

"Well he's not fuckin' here, is he," Carter snapped back. "Fuckin' think of somethin'. _Fast_." He jabbed Lawman's back with the gun.

"What exactly do you expect me to do, Carter? Whip up a vault for you out of my ass?"

"Where would they build a vault in this town?"

"How the fuck should I know?"

"It has to be around here somewhere. Think!"

"For Jesus fuckin' Christ… I don't know where it is, Carter. It could be anywhere. We need to find someplace to hunker down for the night before it's too late."

"Well then, start lookin'. Or you're gonna have one nasty hole in your -."

Suddenly there was an almighty clatter, like that made by a raccoon investigating a bin. The crew looked around. Over on the other side of the road a trash can had just toppled over spilling its contents all over the road. A protectron in a cowboy hat stood over it, clearly the perpetrator who knocked it over. It looked for a prolongued moment at the litter and then turned to face the six people clustered around the sign. It whirred and clunked for a moment as all six of them just stared directly at it.

"Don't move," Lawman breathed. "Whatever you do, don't move a fuckin' muscle."

"I'm gonna shoot it," Carter hissed back.

"Don't be stupid, Carter. We don't want to make it hostile. Just take a step back."

"It's a broken down old world piece of scrap, what have we got to worry about?"

"It's a protectron, Carter. It's an unstable, bulletproof robot with lasers designed to kill anything more hostile than a squirrel. So, back away slowly or it's gonna attack."

"I'm gonna turn and shoot on the count of three, ready?" Vyatch interjected.

"Ready," Carter whispered.

"Are you out of your minds?" Lawman retorted.

"Well, howdy there strangers." The protectron lifted a heavily armoured arm and waved it jovially at the six bewildered figures. Its motion sensors blinked their lights at them. "Are you in need of assistance?"

"Shoot it, shoot it now!" Carter hissed. Before he could act, however, it suddenly bolted over to them at an alarming pace, making them all jump back in startled surprise.

"My name's Barry. Sure is a swell summer evening, isn't it? And guess what?" It waved about its laser arms animatedly, sending Lawman ducking out of the path of their barrels. "I'm as thrilled as you are that you've chosen to visit the birthplace of Giles Wolstencroft, my long time master and best genius in the world EVER! Tell me, what is your most favourite thing about Giles Wolstencroft?"

"Er…" Lawman hesitated. "Look, er, we're, um quite busy, and um…"

"Oh, you are busy too? That's great. So am I. I was just about to clean up that trash can that someone toppled over. We have so much in common. My favourite thing about Mr Wolstencroft is that he is the kindest, most gentlest man on Earth, as well as being a great genius. Now it's your turn."

"Er…My turn?"

"What is your most favourite thing about Master Wolstencroft?

Lawman considered for a moment the positive traits of a man who died over two centuries ago as he gazed at the protectron's demented motion sensors. "He can always keep a secret. You can just tell him anything, and he would never tell a living soul."

"Ooh, that's a good one."

"You bet."

"So, how may I help you today? If you require accommodation then Sunshine Hotel can meet your every need. Or if you want a tour of our quiet little town then just say the word and I can whisk you along our favourited tourist attractions. We have Burty Beats disco parlour, Susy Sue's sweet shop extravaganza, and Moonbuck's coffee is out of this world!" Barry swept its arm in an arc over the scene of decrepit buildings, as though showcasing its wonder.

Lawman looked over to the horizon and saw the Sun cresting over it, sinking farther and farther down and making all of their shadows longer. He didn't have time for games.

"Do you know where Sunshine's vault is, Barry?" Lawman asked, sensing opportunity in this encounter. The others looked at each other in anticipation.

"Sure do. Its entrance is located near the train station, right by the Mississippi."

"The Mississippi?" Carter balked.

"We just came from there," Katherine said.

"The river must loop back around, enveloping this town," Vance replied.

"No one's allowed in though," Barry continued. "It's heavily guarded by the US army. But I bet we can get a look at the entrance if we're real lucky."

"Where's the train station?" Lawman asked the protectron.

"It's over this way," Barry told him as he led the way further into town. Everyone trailed after him and their footsteps echoed off the walls of the empty streets. The clouds overhead grew darker. "I sure do hope you like train rides."

"I wouldn't know," Lawman replied in a preoccupied tone. He glanced shiftily at the sinking sun. It wasn't long until dark now. "I've never been in one – not a working one anyway."

"Shucks, you haven't? Well you're in for one hell of a ride…"

Lawman didn't listen as Barry the protectron whirred into his manic monologue about the town, about the places that once were, about the people who were now less than ghosts haunting Barry's tales. He let it all fade into the background. He had but one thought as the Sun disappeared under the horizon and night time fell upon them – That thought was of the vault and what they might uncover down in its depths.

It started to rain.


	12. Scene 12

**Scene 12**

The road ahead continued to be dappled by spots of rain as, steadily, it began to pour out of the darkening heavens. Clouds overhead seemed to speed unnaturally through the sky, swirling backwards as the wind tore at the company's clothes. For a moment the wind picked up to being so strong that Lawman had to shield his eyes as he pushed his way forward, dust and sand blasting into his face, and sending his travelers overcoat flailing in the gale. The others paced behind, Carter and Katherine seemed to pair up together, keeping close and not losing their mark on either Lawman or the guide who walked slightly behind him. Vance trailed behind slightly with Vyatch who had his gun still holstered, but with his hand resting on its handle. Carter still had his gun trained on Lawman.

Lawman figured there must be some loose wires on this protectron as normally the damn things react if you have a gun waving about. 'Barry' the Protectron, however, advanced while paying no mind to the guns or to the heavy gale as he plodded his way forward. To the protectron the company were just a friendly band of tourists that came to see the sights at Sunshine, a place which, with every passing second, gave Lawman the creeps more and more. It was probably just the protectron. Something about the smooth glare of its screen perturbed him. Lawman felt it was probably one blown fuse away from blasting them all to kingdom come. Lawman never did like protectrons. The trouble was they had no face to read, no expression or emotion, and that meant you never knew what the tin cans were capable of. The Old World before the bombs fell used to make technology their plaything; it was a marvel. Now…now it only existed as a reminder of human failure, ambling along, haunting the streets, as though the silent town was still bustling with people, as though the buildings hadn't crumbled to ruins, as though the lights might suddenly spark back to life and the last few centuries might become a bad dream. The town would never see that life return to it though. It was a graveyard – just like every other Old World town. Lawman shifted uneasily whenever the damn thing – the protectron – 'looked' at him. For now at least its gaze was fixed on the road ahead. Its crimson lights dimly lit the street in the encroaching darkness, sending shadows spilling away from it.

'Barry' the protectron's strange cowboy hat was glued to his head and he wheeled off line after line of tourist info about the town and how it prospered since the age of Vault Tec into a bustling hub of curiosity regarding the great Wolstencroft – _whoever the hell that happened to be_ , Lawman wasn't sure what he thought of a man whose ego was large enough to buy up a town and make it a shrine to himself. _Jesus_ , Lawman thought as he advanced through the eerie ghost town, _I've counted at least six statues of the guy standing throughout the place, not to mention Barry was purpose wired to be so chronically admiring of his 'master'. The fuck?_

 _They were lucky to stumble upon Barry_ , Lawman thought to himself. _But only so long as it actually took them to the vault before it blew a circuit board._

The rain grew heavier.

"Where the fuck is this trashcan taking us?" Carter yelled over the howling wind.

"It's showing us around," Lawman called back. "It's showing us the town…"

"Well tell it we don't give a rat's ass about its stinking town. We need to get to the vault. Now!"

The storm was picking up. Rain fell in torrents throughout the town as streams of water gushed into the drains and cracks in the road, filling them till they swelled and overflowed. It was now almost like walking through the marshes again, and all the while Barry had stopped in front of a house and was wheeling into a speech about how it was Wolstencroft's former childhood home. It went into a programmed reverie about the bastard's top childhood moments.

"…Giles Wolstencroft had a passion for underground complexes ever since he was a curious and passionate child," Barry the protectron recited proudly. "He was once given a goldfish for his eleventh birthday. He no sooner got it from his doting parents then the next day he flushed his new pet down the toilet, took the fish tank and began filling it with compost. He then collected tiny ants, trapped them inside and watched them burrow their way through the soil, fascinated by their community and the way they worked together to build their new home. He'd often experiment with them, such as seeing how they'd react when he fried their queen with his magnifying glass. And even today this quirky hobby of Giles Wolstencroft has fed into the company's working ethos, building cozy vaults for the good of every American community – with absolutely no ulterior motives whatsoever…"

"Barry, hey buddy. Look we love the spiel and all but when are we getting to the vault? It's getting kinda wet out here," Lawman interrupted. The more he heard of this Wolstencroft the more he got goosebumps all down his arms.

Barry seemed to look up for a moment at the thundering clouds overhead and Lawman heard a perturbing series of clicking sounds and whirring as this seemed to be processed by his computer matrix. As it turned out it wasn't Lawman's words it was processing.

"Weather report: blustery gales with heightened rainfall…" it stated as though reading off the results of a computer scan.

"Yeah, pal, we know! Can we hurry it up here?" Lawman shouted over the wind.

"…Humidity: sixty percent. Rainfall: chronic. Likely outcome: intense flooding and possible hurricane." Barry whirred and clunked his way through its report. "Would you like to hear how Giles Wolstencroft got his glasses?"

"Woah, woah, woah. Hold on there. Did it say hurricane? Did you say a fucking hurricane?" Carter snapped at the thing.

"My Mayweather!" Vance cried out.

"No one gives a damn about your fuckin' Mayweather!" Vyatch retorted.

"It's the only way out of this hell!"

"Not to worry Mr Carter," Barry answered. "In the eventuality of a hurricane my faultless state of the art progra-progra-progra-progra-programming is set to guide you to a safe desi-designated area. Currently the probability of a hurricane is improbable. By my calculations you can rest easy with only thirty-five percent probability of a fatality…" Barry made a noise like a computer's dying death rattle, sort of like the sound of two nightstalkers fighting in a sack. The company just gaped at the thing.

There was a pause.

"Would you like to hear how Giles Wolstencroft got his glasses?" It reiterated.

"Fucking shit! The damn things broke!" Carter exclaimed.

"We need to get to the vault now, before we're swept up in this storm," Katherine called out as the wind lashed at her ponytail. "You," She pointed her gun at Lawman. "Tell it to show us where the train station is. Now!"

"Please keep your toy Vault-Tec guns in your pockets at all times," Barry blurted.

" _Fuck's sake!_ " Lawman turned to the centuries old bundle of wires and ancient computer code that was Barry the Protectron. "Hey. Hey, Barry? Barry, we need you to show us where the train station is. Can you do that for us, buddy?" _Christ, the damn thing freaked him out._

"Sure thing," It chirped. "The train station's right at the end of the tour. If you like we could go there right after I've shown you…"

"No. no. Barry, we need to get there now. We've got – We've got a train to catch," Lawman struggled to get his voice heard over the howling gale that roared over him. Wind and rain whipped into his face. "We gotta go, Barry! We gotta go now!"

The protectron struggled for a second. There was more whirring as its fans worked overtime. Eventually it turned to Lawman with its blinking motion sensors. "Alrighty partner. I'll guide you there now. But just so you know, you're missing out on…"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm sure its spectacular Barry, I really am. But we're busy and we really need to get moving here."

"Well then buckle up, buckaroos." It turned on the spot and began to plod its way forward up the deserted street. The rain fell hard now, falling in torrents that washed over everyone. Rainwater cascaded from what remained of the roofs, and rivulets of the stuff constantly streamed down everyone's garb.

Lawman didn't have time for the protectron's leisurely amble though. _How could something that darted over to them so fast before move so slowly now?_

"Barry just point us the way," Lawman instructed, pulling ahead of the others so that he could talk to the thing. "Just tell us which direction to go and we'll take ourselves. Okay?"

"Well, ain't someone in a hurry," the thing answered back as it fixed its gaze on Lawman. Lawman's face was bathed with the glaring red light of its screen. It seemed to hesitate a moment, and for a minute Lawman almost believed he'd offended the thing, almost believed it was going to lash out in retaliation. Lawman's hand intuitively idled over his right hip – before he realized his gun was in the hands of that son of a bitch, Carter. His palms were sweaty.

"The train station is located near the end of this street. Turn to the right at Betty Boop's Make Up parlour and it'll be on your left," Barry said at last. "You can't miss-miss-miss it."

"Thank you, Barry," Lawman replied gratefully.

"No problemo, partner."

"Stop talking to the fuckin' thing and get a move on!" Carter hissed by Lawman's ear as he pressed the gun into the small of his back.

Lawman wondered, for a second, if he could somehow get the protectron to respond to Carter's threats; if he could get it to attack and maybe allow him to make his escape. Lawman considered it as he took in the gathering storm, as the demented protectron stood in front of them, whirring and clunking its way through processing what Carter said, the lights of its motion sensors flickering alarmingly. Lawman considered it.

Then Lawman moved on. He marched ahead of the group with Carter close behind, gun never too far from Lawman's back. The others followed too. They all advanced as speedily as they could through the gale, down the winding street, passing shattered shop windows with shards of fractured glass jutting from their rotting window frames, and more strange statues of Wolstencroft. _How many of those had they now passed? Seven? Eight?_ This one had the Vault Tec logo engraved on its bronze lapel. It appeared to watch him like an eye.

He didn't like the odds – the chances of escape were marginal to say the least. He didn't know if the protectron would have responded. That was problem one. Problem two was if the thing did respond it might shoot him in the process. Problem three was Carter might shoot him as he made his escape. And problem four was the biggest one of all: _where the fuck was he gonna run?_ He had no food, no water and no gun. Even if he could escape Carter, where would he go?

He looked back for a moment at the guide. Her face revealed nothing. She didn't seem worried about the storm, or about being held at gunpoint, but there was something about her that seemed… _prepared._ Lawman wasn't quite sure but she looked like she might be alert, looking for an opening, an opportunity, to kill them all.

She met his gaze and he didn't put any of it past her. _She's the one you have to look out for,_ that's what Vance had said. Lawman began to think he might be right. Despite trying to save her, despite being locked up together, her eyes betrayed no hint of compassion. Her eyes were the eyes of a coyote.

They rounded a corner where there was a dilapidated building with the faded words 'Betty Boop' along the front sign, and eventually came upon what must have been the train station. Lawman heard the gushing waters of the Mississippi before his eyes latched onto the station. The river was swelling, closing in on the town. It already spilled over to the train tracks, flowing underneath the gridded metal walkway that went from the station to a tram that waited outside a dark concrete tunnel that plunged its way deep underground. The river didn't froth and gurgle its way up to the mouth of the tunnel yet; its opening and the tram that rested on the tracks leading into it were both elevated above the ground. Lawman's sharp eyes also spotted something else. There was a surveillance camera looking over the tunnel entrance, another watching the inside of the rickety wooden station, and yet another watching their approach down the street. Lawman didn't expect they were on; the milky white lights in the tunnel weren't powered up after all, but it still gave him chills. He was reminded of the plaque just outside of Sunshine – the one with the 'smiling' people under the Vault Tec logo, caught forever under it, their smiles turned through age to looking like screams.

The company made their way into the shelter of the wooden train station, rows of seats stretching along its expansive length like tombstones in an empty graveyard. The walls were painted white, but the paint was peeling and the whole thing looked like it might not be left standing after the storm. The windows rattled as the wind blew against them and the walls appeared to shake, the planks of wood that formed them creaking under the strain.

Further on, the walls had already collapsed where the gridded metal walkway made its way up to the tram area. Railings caked in rust that rattled in the gale clung to the sides of the walkway, which hung over the gushing waters of the swollen Mississippi up ahead. Waves frothed and clashed against the concrete base of the tunnel, the waters swirling dangerously underneath, and beyond that trees waved violently in the gale. Some had fallen, uprooted by the raging river. However, the roof of the station, unlike the trees, had clung on, arcing over the tram and the walkway before collapsing the other side and forming a barricade that buffeted against the wind, but rocked slightly as it was tugged at by the waves of the Mississippi.

"My Mayweather is gonna be fucked," Vance breathed with a small and forlorn voice. "Over twenty years. Twenty years I've had her. Fuck. It's all gone to pot now." He slumped himself down on one of the nearby chairs and resigned himself to the situation, to the fate of his vessel, and to what Lawman knew was his dwindling life. "I always knew I'd die down here, in the South. My gut always told me so. Coyote's sometimes return to their birthplace to die. This wasn't where I was born, maybe, but it was where I became a man."

The others stayed silent as they caught their breath, rubbing their hands together or rubbing their shoulders to keep warm. Lawman's face felt numb, frozen by the harsh cold wind and the rain that had stung like ice. They were warmer now, though their clothes were still dripping, but they weren't safe. The wind was picking up, and the windows rattled more fiercely.

"There," Carter whispered, almost to himself, his voice feverish as he licked his lips with anticipation. "Over there." He pointed to the tram and to the tunnel that lead the way down, down and further down into the impenetrable darkness beyond. The milky white lights glimmered like eyes blinded by cataracts, before being swallowed by the inky blackness. Who knew what waited for them down in its depths. "Somewhere down there is the entrance to the vault. Has to be."

Suddenly, he barked out in laughter, slapping a hand over his thigh. He jabbed a finger at the tram. "We've found it, boys! We've only gone and fuckin' found it! Ha ha ha," he swung Katherine round in an embrace and kissed. "We're one step closer to that cold hard cash."

"We're finally gonna make it, baby," Katherine cooed. She ran her fingers through Carter's grimy hair. "At long last, after all those contracts, this is the big one."

"We better get moving," Vyatch rumbled, as he looked around at the rickety interior of the station. "This place doesn't look like it's gonna hold out for too long."

"Relax, Vyatch. It's all in the bag now." Katherine shot him a grin.

"Hardly," Vyatch replied. "This ain't Lost Orleans. I dunno about you two, but until my fingers close around that tech file, and we're flown the hell out of this place, I don't count the job as a done thing." His shifty eyes looked suspiciously over to the guide. His grip on his gun tightened, his knuckles turning white as bone.

"Vyatch," Katherine huffed. She strode over to him and grasped him by the chin, turning his face towards her. Vyatch's cruel eyes glared back at her. "Stop being so pessimistic and find something useful to do. Okay hon'?"

She turned her back and strode away, leaving Vyatch messaging his chin and his hurt pride.

Carter turned and leered at Lawman, pointing his gun towards him and motioned him to step forward. "You're up, scavver."

"Is there ever a moment when I'm not?" Lawman replied drily, though he stepped forward anyway. It was a choice between the storm, which was gradually picking up into a hurricane, or the foreboding tunnel that lay ahead of him. Although he had misgivings about it he chose the tunnel.

The company followed as Carter shoved Lawman ahead of him, once again holding Lawman's own gun behind his back. "I want to say, Lawman," Carter spoke softly, his voice dripping with malice, "that you're gonna make me one rich, rich man."

" _Money makes strange bedfellows_ ," Lawman recited, eerily echoing Oswald's words from so long ago, before he'd agreed to go on this crazy venture. He didn't know why he said it either. Something deep in his core just spoke the words without fathoming why, or understanding what for. He felt de ja vu for some reason. Although why he should feel that way he had no clue. Yet the feeling irked him, itched at the back of his mind like his lust for liquor.

Carter gave Lawman a strange look, and then just grinned; a big, cocky and nasty grin that stretched over his face. "Not for too long, Lawman." Carter patted him on the shoulder. "Not for too long."

They all made their way out of the train station and along the walkway, ambling along the gridded metal path, clinging to the shaky railings as the waves of the Mississippi crashed beneath them. They were shielded from the rain but the wind once again snatched at their clothes as it whistled through the passage. The guide followed behind Carter, pushed forward by Vyatch, then Katherine and finally Vance. The froth and spray shot through the gridded floor, soaking Lawman's trousers as he tentatively stepped forward, cautiously stepping over the gaping holes where the metal had rusted away to nothing, and made his way around to the tram's entrance: a set of folding metal doors at its side.

He looked inside through the tram's murky windows and caught sight of the control panel, putting his hands either side of his face as he peered in. A familiar socket was situated beside the controls; a place for him to plug in his pip-boy and start the engine. He might have to hack into the computer terminal by the side as well to gain access. All in all, it was a thankfully easy task, no different to countless other times he'd found a use for his pip-boy, and used it to scavenge areas others couldn't get to.

He pressed his hands against the glass pane, and felt it chill his fingers. He thought desperately for a moment, pressing his forehead against the window, trying to think of any way out of this predicament. He thought of his aching stomach. He thought of how long he might still be useful to Carter and how much time he might have left. He felt failure haunt him.

"This is no time to rest, Lawman," Carter intoned. "Can you work this thing?" It was a question spoken with a deadly tone to it, one that suggested more than trouble if the answer was 'no'.

"Of course, I can. Just as soon as you crack this thing open." He pulled his head back and considered the tram. It was a great big steel coffin leading to the unknown.

"Good."

Carter reached for the handle of the folding doors, and no sooner did he do so, than a resounding voice boomed over them, as though emanating from the intercom, as though the Old World had suddenly woken with a vengeance. They all spun around…

…And were cast in the red glow of a glaring screen. They all froze in terror as Barry the protectron's motion sensor lights flickered alarmingly and it pointed its laser arms directly at the company. It blared the same message from the foot of the walkway over and over: "TRESPASSING ON VAULT TEC PROPERTY!"

Its fans hissed like cobras as they whirred into overdrive, and its blinking lights flashed with unforeseen menace.

"FATAL ACTION: IMMINENT!"


	13. Scene 13

**Scene 13**

"TRESPASSING ON VAULT TEC PROPERTY!"

The company froze on the spot. Their faces caught in the red glare of the protectron's screen. Barry repeated its dire warning, only for each of them to stand stock still. Vance shifted backwards bumping into Vyatch. He was the most exposed to the protectron's lasers, being the one who was lingering in front of everyone else. Lawman saw his hands shaking.

Carter kept his fist closed around the tram handle, as though it were stuck there, as though Carter's greed for the tech file kept it in place. His dark eyes shifted from the tram to the protectron.

"Carter," Lawman breathed, a sharp whisper that cut beneath the blaring message of the protectron, "remove your hand…Slowly. Just, very calmly, take your hand from the handle, Carter."

But Carter's cold eyes were fixed on the tram doors. There was a moment when his fingers clutched the handle tighter. "No." His harsh voice could cut through ice, though it was barely a whisper too.

Lawman stared at the man stood before him, almost disbelieving what he was hearing.

The protectron's warning got louder. "FATAL ACTION: IMMINENT!" It screamed in its horrifically mechanical voice. "STEP AWAY FROM VAULT TEC PROPERTY!"

"What the hell do you think you're doing, Carter?" Lawman hissed. "You're gonna get us all killed!"

Lawman saw Carter's hand holster his weapon and drift down to his satchel. Lawman looked down and saw the barrel of a sawn-off shotgun glinting in its depths.

"YOU HAVE TEN SECONDS TO COMPLY!"

"Are you crazy?" Lawman was almost apoplectic. The thing had leveled its fucking lasers at them and here was Carter thinking he could out gun it, that he could draw faster than a machine that only needed to send a tiny electric pulse through its wiring and blast them all to kingdom come with its goddamn turrets. "Carter," Lawman beseeched urgently, "walk away. We can come back later. We can work around the thing. Carter!"

"No," Carter hissed, his breath fogging up the window in front of him, his dark eyes locked on the tram door. "I didn't come all this way to be stopped by a fuckin' tin can with legs…"

"VAULT TEC IS OFF LIMITS!" Barry screeched, its motion sensor light flickering madly. "COMPLY OR FACE SUMMARY EXECUTION!"

"Carter, this is an armored laser turret with legs and an unstable computer program that's just as erratic as it is blown to fritz! We can come back later!"

"With this storm? There might not be a later," Carter hissed back. His hand drifted further down.

"FIVE!" the demented Barry counted down. Carter's hand fished deeper in his satchel.

"Carter, you're good but you're not that good…"

"FOUR!" The protectron blared, its motion sensor light flickering wildly. Lawman could hear the hum of its lasers as they began to charge.

"Lawman, you better shut your face or else you're gonna be next," Carter replied.

"THR-."

Carter spun around. His hand was a blur as it swung out of his satchel carrying with it the sawn off shotgun. It gleamed madly in the red glare of Barry's screen. Barry's motion sensor light pulsed one last time, and then flared brighter than before; one perturbing and protracted needle of light that pierced Lawman's eyes. No one else reacted. No one else had time to react.

There was a boom, as if the sound fell from the sky like thunder, and the shotgun blasted its round. Choking smoke spewed forth from the barrel as it shot its load into the protectron's side. It staggered. The sound of rending steel and screeching metal filled the air, as though Barry was itself screaming its fearsome mechanized scream. For a split second its armor was ripped to ribbons.

It returned fire. There was a sound like the crack of a whip as its lasers erupted, flashing like strobe lights and instantly filling the air with red fire. One beam of light luckily struck above them like forked lightning, scorching the wind and vaporizing rain. The second beam was less lucky for the company. It found its mark. Lawman saw the beam strike and thought it looked like a flash in a frying pan. It _smelled_ like a flash in a frying pan. The odor of burnt flesh chokingly filled the air as Vance's leg erupted into flames. His piercing screams scarcely left his lips when Lawman finally dived for the ground and took cover.

Then there was just chaos. Round after round blasted overhead from the Cazadors, as they whirled into action. Lawman scrambled on the floor over to Vance, the spray from the raging waves beneath hungrily lashing out at him through the gridded walkway. They gleamed in the red glare of Barry's screen like tongues of fire. Lawman speedily took off his coat amidst the crashing waves and crashing fire of the guns and made his way to Vance.

Vance was sprawled on the floor tossing and turning wildly as the fire crept up his body like a lover's searing caress. His screams and shrieks were piercing as he desperately tried to put out the fire, his arms flailing wildly as the hungry flames busily ate away at his legs. The guns boomed overhead as Lawman crawled forwards.

The fire reached Vance's genitals.

Lawman reached him and desperately threw his coat over him. It was sodden and heavy, and for a moment it refused to spread out, especially as Vance rolled wildly.

"Jesus fuck!" Lawman cursed. He unfurled the coat and flung it over once again. He enveloped the fire with it and the flames subsided to a dying sizzle; a sick curdling sound so similar to frying bacon.

Vance's blood curdling screams continued.

Smoke and steam rose in a shimmering screen from the coat, and it merged and blended with the gun smoke so that the entire walkway felt like a sauna from hell. There was smoke behind Lawman, smoke either side of him, above him, and in front of him was the shimmering shroud of steam and the sickening scent of roasted flesh. Suddenly, Kees' words flashed through his head, haunting him, echoing from the time they'd investigated the distant fire. 'What? You don't think I know what burnt flesh smells like?' Those words cycled through his brain like a record stuck on repeat, '… don't think I know what burnt flesh smells like?' It was almost as though, as Lawman found himself drowned by the sound of gunfire, Kees was coming back to sneer at him. '…don't think I know what burnt flesh…'

Lawman looked up.

And through the shimmering haze he caught Barry glaring directly at him, catching him in that red glow. Its motion sensor light, that thin needle of piercing white that slipped through your eyes, focused directly on him. Its lasers pointed at his face. Their humming grew louder, building to a deadly crescendo. Lawman froze.

Then there was one last deafening explosion as Vyatch's gun fired its armor piercing round straight into Barry's 'head'. The protectron rocked back slightly, and then powered down. The red glow that bathed Lawman died like the setting sun, its thin needle of piercing white light vanished, its arms drooped, and its cowboy hat came loose and flopped to the floor.

Suddenly, the relic of the old world returned to where it truly belonged.

The guns ceased but Vance was still yelping in pain, crumpled on the walkway, with Lawman's coat trailed over his legs like a funeral shroud that had been pulled back.

"Sweet mother of – _fuck!_ – Jesus, someone… Someone give me a stimpack!" Lawman shouted over the yelping of the man in front of him. Lawman didn't know what to do. What could he do? All he could do was listen to Vance as the grown man pitifully cried out for his mother, wailing at the top of his lungs.

The Cazadors simply hung back and watched impassively as the man wailed in pain. "Get up, Lawman," Carter spoke in his cold stony voice. He put away his smoking sawn off shotgun and retrieved Lawman's Colt 45 from its holster. He once again pointed it directly at Lawman's back. "We've got a vault to open."

Lawman looked around. Katherine, Vyatch and Carter simply looked back with cold, dead eyes. "Your vault?" he gazed at each one of them, stunned by their indifference. Anger flared in him as suddenly as a match being struck. "Fuck your goddamn vault, you jackals! Vance is dying here and all you can think about is the damn tech file? Stuff Oswald's fuckin' text file!"

He stood up, fists clenched and trembling like a leaf.

"Easy there, Lawman," Katherine said. She cocked her gun. "We need you to open up the vault, so you do that and we'll take care of Vance."

Vyatch strode over to Vance, brushing past Lawman, and for a moment he looked like he might aim his gun directly at Vance's head and splatter his brains into the raging river beneath them. Instead he fished in his pockets and withdrew some Med-X. He stuck the needle in Vance's neck and injected the purple liquid into his bloodstream. It didn't take long for Vance's screams to die down into a soft murmur.

"There you go, Lawman," Katherine said at last. "Vance will soon be flying high as a kite. High enough that the pain will never reach him. You, however, hon', might not be so lucky."

"Get moving, Lawman," Carter grunted.

Lawman turned back around to look at Vance before stepping up to the tram. Lawman saw him almost lull into sleep before Vyatch slapped him around the face, stirring him from wakeless slumber. "Not yet, old man," Vyatch rumbled. "You're not going anywhere yet."

Carter stepped over, sat on his hunches before Vance and looked him straight in the eye. "Look here, partner." He spat as though he'd been chewing tobacco. "It's your choice. You can either die, a wasted loner out here in this devil's sweat sack of a town, or you can stay alive for a little longer and be of use to us. Which is it gonna be?"

Vance's eyes burned.

"You gonna be useful?" Carter repeated.

"Aye. And damn that robot. Damn it to hell!" Vance retorted. "I always knew I'd die out here. But I'll be damned if I go out mewling like a Brahmin!"

"Good," Carter gave Vance more Med-X, before propping his body against the railing and handing him a walkie-talkie. "You're lookout," Carter said. "If anything comes our way. If anything approaches the vault whilst we're in there, you let us know."

Vance nodded, eyes burning brightly through the sea of numbing pain.

Katherine's eyes scanned the company, before she spun around and looked wildly about her. "What the fuck?" she shouted.

"What?" Carter looked to her.

"The guide – that _bitch!_ "

Carter looked around and Lawman saw his brow darken as he realized it too. The guide was no longer there. Somewhere between the shots fired and Vance becoming incapacitated she had slipped away, and now as each of them looked through the storm, the torrents of rain falling outside sending rainwater cascading from the town buildings, they could see no sign of the southerner. She was gone, somewhere out in the ghost town, or the willows beyond it, and making good her escape. Or else she was lurking somewhere in the town, waiting to ambush them, and Lawman didn't put that past her either.

Either way they were unlikely to find her now. She'd seized her opportunity and gone for it. Lawman, left behind with the Cazadors and an ever shrinking crew, felt a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. He was the only one left – the only one still trapped with Carter and his team. He began to feel he should have run too, but he was foreign to this land. The guide was not. He wondered how far she'd get, whether she would survive out there. Somehow, after all she'd been put through, he felt they hadn't seen the last of her.

"FUCK!" Carter almost screamed as he bolted to the railing and aimed his gun out to the stormy streets, searching for a silhouette, a shadow, anything human looking that he could shoot and destroy. Eventually, after finding nothing down the ghostly roads, and hearing nothing but the pitter patter of rain, he pulled back his gun. He punched the railing, pommeling it with his fists until it fell loose and clattered into the swirling river below. "Curse her fuckin' eyes!"

"What should we do, Carter?" Vyatch asked from the corner. "Should we go after her?"

Carter spun around and almost looked like he might shoot them all right there, before his temper cooled and his cruel eyes turned to Vyatch.

"No," he said at last. "The storm will kill the whore. We don't need her. We've got the vault in our sights and we've been held up for long enough." His eyes locked on Lawman. "We've got everything we need."

With that Carter strode over to Vance. He gave him a kick and Vance winced in pain. "You better make sure you do your job, old man," Carter hissed vehemently. He handed Vance a luger. "If she comes back here put one between her eyes."

"Aye," Vance croaked.

Lawman, however, felt sure she wouldn't return just yet. He turned from Vance and picked up his slightly charred coat from the ground and dusted it off. It was still serviceable, he guessed, and he put it on once again. Its tattered ends were now more tattered (and blackened to boot) as they draped about the back of his knees and trailed in the wind.

Carter then stormed to the tram, seized its handle and finally tugged the sliding door open. The four of them stepped inside, with Lawman in front of course. Lawman didn't need prompting. He didn't want a gun being prodded in his back again and so he busied himself with the controls, plugging in his pip-boy and accessing the computer panel. All the while Lawman noticed Vyatch studying the controls and watching Lawman like a hawk, reading his movements. It took Lawman a while to realize that Vyatch was learning how to use the pip-boy. A shiver ran down Lawman's spine.

They wouldn't need him for long.

Soon the tram's lights flickered on and the whole thing, from the outside, looked like a lamp-lit coach lost in a swirl of dark rain and shadowy streets, about to make its way into the underworld.

Lawman guessed it really was an underworld of a sort they were going to break their way into, and God only knew what waited for them there. The vaults were enclosed, isolated pockets of the old world buried deep underground like pharoahs' tombs. They were like an old bedroom of someone who'd died, a perfectly preserved shrine, and their family had never moved on. Humanity hadn't moved on from the pre-war age but the world had, and all it had left were shells of corporate buildings whose dark secrets spilled forth like whispers from their husks, sinister propaganda posters and music that still haunted the ruins of cities, and quirky robots with nice manners and the predisposition to fry your brain.

But in the vaults it felt like you were actually setting foot once more in that time. It felt like trespassing on holy ground. The age of Fancy Lad Snacks and exclamations of 'Gee Willikers!' and summer Football games on the lawn were long dead, haunting the faded posters and crackly music that survived the bombs, but the vaults - they felt _alive_. Something still beat in the heart of those vast underground complexes and it had always disturbed Lawman, more than anything else he'd seen of this cursed world.

The tram started to move.

It creaked as it slowly ground along the rusted tracks and the tunnel in front of them grew larger, swallowing them all whole as they plunged into its depths. The milky white lights that dimly gleamed in the darkness led their way further and further down, as behind them the storm, the crashing waves and Vance grew smaller and fainter and more distant.

They trundled into silence, the only claustrophobic sound being that of the rickety tram – a steel coffin leading them to the unknown.

Lawman's hands grew clammy as the tram kept on its course. There was nothing to say that something wouldn't stop it – a cave in that they might crash into. But the journey proved to be smooth as the tram eventually drew to a gentle stop.

Vyatch remained by Lawman's side, watching closely.

Before them the tracks led to the vault doors, tightly sealed by a great metal wheel that covered the entrance like a boulder to a sarcophagus. Something flashed on the tram's computer screen.

"Uh-oh," Lawman groaned. He wiped the dust off the flickering monitor.

"What's happened? Why aren't we moving?" Carter snapped from behind Lawman's shoulder.

"It's asking me if we want to continue," Lawman replied cautiously. "It says 'Bio-Hazard'."

"What do you mean, 'Bio-Hazard'?"

"I don't know. That's just what it says…"

"Keep moving."

"Shouldn't we think about this?"

"That guy entered this vault, right. The one Oswald talked about. The one who'd discovered a tech file existed. So clearly he wasn't deterred." Carter reached over and jabbed a finger towards the Vault door. "Open it."

And that was it. Lawman hesitantly reached over to the control panel and pressed 'release'. There was an alarm sounding as an amber siren-light flashed overhead, intermittently lighting the tunnel and sending it back into darkness again. The great steel wheel that was the vault door slowly clunked and then began to slide back revealing a fine sliver of blinding white light. As it rolled backwards the crescent of light grew until it engulfed and swallowed the entire tram. It blinded them, like an intense full moon.

As each of the crew shielded their eyes the tram once again pulled forward.

"WELCOME TO VAULT TEC," a mechanized but distinctly female voice resounded above them. It sounded eerily insincere and mocking.

"ENJOY YOUR STAY."


	14. Scene 14

**Scene 14**

The tram trundled its way into the vault, entering into a sea of artificial light as the tracks creaked under its weight. As the crew's eyes adjusted the tram came to a sudden and jerksome stop, throwing them all forward slightly. The doors folded back and led to a gridded walkway similar to the one outside but situated within a vast cavernous space, with the steel wheel of the vault door on one side, and two sliding doors on the other side. One of those doors led to a walled off control panel for the vault door, the other was clearly an elevator that led the way down into the vault proper. Both were made of sturdy steel with the Vault Tec logo still emblazoned on them in faded paint.

Lawman was the first to step outside the tram. His feet clapped on the gridded walkway and echoed around the spacious chamber. In the distance, just faintly, he could still hear the storm crashing overhead and the raging waves of the Mississippi but that noise was mostly drowned by the eerie silence that accompanied them all now. Looking back he could see a small pin point of grim grey light at the end of the long tunnel they had passed through. Escape was now far, far away.

As Carter, Katherine and finally Vyatch stepped out of the tram, looking around the vast space before them, Lawman's eyes were drawn to the far wall. It was a perfect sheet of purest white, with very little grime or dust smearing its fine coat of paint. This wasn't what caught Lawman's eye however. The thing that caught his attention was the decaying human skeleton propped up by the elevator door in sharp contrast to the clean wall. It sat next to an ancient 10mm pistol that had been dropped on the walkway. The crumbling skeleton had a gaping hole through its temple. Lawman hadn't a clue who the guy had been (one of the Vault Tec residents he supposed), but whoever it had been, one of his friends had clearly used the poor guy's blood to scribble a message on the perfect white wall above its shattered skull.

Lawman took a few cautious steps closer to the faded scrawl that besmirched the pure white wall, whiter than bone, and narrowed his shrewd eyes as he read the smeared, crimson-turn-black message. It read, 'Don't go down to the basement.'

"How the fuck did they manage to build all this?" Katherine gazed about at the tunnel and the vault that lay before her in awe. "I heard of Vaults but I thought the damn things would be tiny."

"You thought wrong," Lawman replied absent-mindedly, his eyes never leaving the message on the wall. He felt his stomach twist in knots as he read it, a sense of foreboding seeping through to his bones.

"How the hell can they have been smart enough to have constructed this thing and yet have been dumb enough to have blown it all up?"

"Blown what all up?" Vyatch asked.

But Lawman was the one who answered the question. "The world..." he breathed, as he stepped back from the message at last. He struggled to take his eyes off of it. The morbid fascination fixated him. _Where the hell was the basement? Why would someone warn him in such a gruesome way not to go down there?_ He glanced at the elevator, its shaft no doubt penetrating deeper into the vault and its different levels. _What was in the basement?_

"Vance, can you hear me?" Carter's gravelly voice broke Lawman's chain of thought as he spoke into the walkie-talkie. It crackled a while before Vance's voice came through the static.

"I can hear you alright," he replied, his voice sounding distant and wheezing. "It's getting pretty wild out here."

"You remember what I said, old man," Carter returned. "That guide comes back and you shoot her dead. You copy?"

"I copy ya," Vance's voice crackled in the silence. The sound of static filled the chamber. "Loud and clear."

"Good."

"Carter?"

"What is it?"

"It's gettin' pretty hairy up top. Wind's picking up like nobody's business and river's churning deep. Better hurry on up down there."

"We'll take as long as it takes, old man. You just make sure you stay awake, y'hear?"

And with that Carter turned off the walkie-talkie and tucked it into his belt. He swaggered over to the door that led to the control room. There was a window by its side and Carter peered through it. He saw a control panel not dissimilar to the one on the tram.

Lawman wondered how long Vance would live up there on the surface. It had to be icy cold out there. The dilapidated roof might provide shelter from the freezing rain but not from the howling gale that was whipping the swollen river into a frenzy. At the moment he was kept alive through a mixture of drugs and sheer willpower, but with wounds like the ones he had he couldn't possibly cling on for much longer, especially out in that chilling environment. Lawman felt certain he'd die before this part of the mission was over.

"Lawman," Carter called over. He waved his gun, beckoning Lawman to him. "There's a computer terminal over here. If we're gonna find out where that tech file is we might as well start here."

Lawman stepped over to the doors, pushed the button for it to open and stepped inside. The air was stale. It was immediately apparent that not a soul had set foot in this room for decades – maybe even centuries. Lawman coughed as he made his way over to the computer terminal. He didn't even need to hack into it. It immediately loaded up a screen that said:

'Vault Status Report:-

Life Support Systems: Offline, Ventilation Systems: Offline, Security Countermeasures: Offline, Power to Security Cameras: Minimal, Lighting: Minimal, Calculator: Irreparable.

Quarantine Alert in Vault Sub-Levels – Override at own risk.

Vault Tec Construction and Maintenance Reports:-

[September 14th, 2076 (overwritten)]

[January 10th, 2077 (overwritten)]

[March 7th, 2077 (overwritten)]

[August 30th, 2077 (overwritten)]

[October 23rd, 2077 (overwritten)]…'

Lawman scrolled down further, the green letters on the screen eerily lighting his face, and found these reports ended on December 5th 2112. He clicked on one at random and immediately understood what the 'overwritten' statement meant. The report flickered up on screen and simply read, 'Don't go in the basement. Stay away from the basement. Don't go down to the basement. Stay out of the basement. Keep away from the basement…' over and over again.

"Okay..." he murmured to himself. He went back and clicked on the first report, the one dated September 14th, 2076. It read exactly the same as the first.

'Keep forever out of the basement…'

"Oh, great," Lawman said drily. He turned around and stepped out of the control room. Carter looked at him suspiciously.

"Well? What does it say?"

"Go see for yourself," Lawman replied. He lifted a tremulous hand to his forehead. "I need a fuckin' drink." He strode over to a map of the vault on the far wall.

Carter went inside and looked at the terminal himself. Lawman shut his eyes briefly. This vault was off. Off in the sense that whatever went down in this place he felt positively certain he was better off not knowing about it. He gazed at the map and wasn't surprised to find that there wasn't any illustration of 'the basement'. That wasn't to say that there wasn't a basement. There was. Lawman could see that it was only accessible through the overseer's office which lay at the heart of everything else, but it wasn't illustrated. There was no map of 'the basement'. There was only the overseer's office and an arrow pointing from it labelled, 'to the basement'. And where the basement should have been laid out on the map there was only crisp, white emptiness. There was only blank space. There was nothing.

 _What did it mean?_

Lawman heard Carter whack the terminal a couple of times as though it was broken, the brutish banging echoing around the chamber, but it wasn't broken. It was the Vault that was broken. And whoever the survivors had been, Lawman bet they had been broken too. He looked over to the skeleton. It was dressed in a Vault Tec lab coat and Lawman wondered whether the guy had been murdered or had instead committed suicide. He stepped over to it and on closer inspection found a note curled up in its fist. Lawman picked away the finger bones and lifted the yellowing scrap of paper up for him to see. There were words scribbled erratically on the page in black ink, but it was smudged as though from tears and hard to read. Lawman read the message out loud in the haunting quiet.

"I'm sorry," he read, Vyatch and Katherine looking over to him in stony silence. "We had no choice. We had to quarantine them. You have to know that […] couldn't let them escape. Left so much behind. Destroyed…Calcu…the overseer was… They infec… the brain matter […] It was all a lie. This vault was never a safe haven. It wasn't even a tomb. It was a petri dish of nightmares. God save us all…"

Lawman let the chilling page drop from his fingers. It fell to the ground like an autumn leaf. _A petri dish of nightmares,_ Lawman thought to himself, _just what exactly had he let himself in for?_ Vyatch and Katherine weren't unfazed, but they masked it well.

Carter stalked out of the computer room, pointing back to the terminal. "What sort of ten grades of crazy do you have to be to write all that?" he exclaimed. "Fuck me! We'll just have to try to find out more inside the vault."

"You still want to go in there?" Lawman asked.

Carter laughed. "It's what we came here for isn't it? And guess who's heading out in front," Carter sneered as he pointed the Colt 45 at Lawman's chest. "And don't even think about going for that 10mm on the floor. I'll shoot you dead before you touch the handle."

The thought had never crossed Lawman's mind. The gun was ancient, most likely in dire need of repair and likely to backfire. "Relax, Carter. I ain't going nowhere."

"You sure ain't." He motioned for Lawman to get moving and Lawman reluctantly pressed the 'open' button on the elevator.

There was a short tinging sound as the doors slid open. The light inside the elevator was late in flickering on, leaving Lawman facing pitch black through the open doors for a second. For a moment Lawman thought the elevator had broken down, that there was only a bottomless pit stretching all the way down. If there were a bottomless pit there Carter would probably still force him down it. As it was they all stepped inside and allowed the doors to smoothly close shut behind them. Lawman felt a moment of inertia as they slowly began to descend, leaving behind the tunnel that led them here, leaving behind the storm and the wilds, that small pin-prick of grim grey light that was the outside world. The only tether they had to the outside world from this moment on was Carter's walkie-talkie, which was clipped tightly onto his belt.

"Vance, can you still hear me?" Carter spoke into it.

The crackling grew louder, but Vance's voice could still be made out through the static. "Aye I'm still here."

The elevator clunked to a stop and the doors slid open to reveal inky darkness outside the small cone of light that the company stood under in the elevator. It was darkness so impenetrable as to make one believe one had turned blind. If the elevator light turned off right then and there Lawman wouldn't have been able to see his hand in front of his face.

Lawman's palms grew sweaty. _There could have been anything lurking beyond the elevator doors_.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Carter nudged Lawman with the tip of his gun. Lawman stepped warily outside and used his pip-boy light as best as he could to see ahead of him. It lit up like a pale green beacon and Lawman was instantly reminded of St. Louis, the rows and rows of dark aisles, and the ten year old boy he'd got his pip-boy from. There was a desk, cluttered, with a terminal to the right. Lawman was just able to read the sign saying, 'reception' that was bathed in the unnatural green light of his pip-boy. To the immediate left was a sign pointing down a seemingly never-ending corridor labelled, 'Orientation'.

Lawman took another step and almost jumped when the nearest overhead light flickered on, suddenly spilling its artificial light over the scene. Lawman remembered what the Vault Status Report had said; 'Lighting: minimal'. _Apparently, the lights would come on as he approached them..._

The others stepped out of the elevator, following after him, and were startled to find the cone of light, the safely lit haven behind the elevator doors, vanish suddenly, leaving the darkness to stalk behind them.

… _And, apparently the lights would turn off again as they left them._

All of which meant, of course, that none of them could see more than five feet in front of them or behind them at any given time.

Lawman, thinking on his feet, swung an office chair out from behind the reception desk and kicked it, sending it wheeling down the corridor. The next light flickered on and the blackness ahead shrunk back.

"Alright," Lawman said, dusting his hands. "They're triggered by motion sensors. This is workable."

He didn't wait to be prompted by the others. He walked around behind the desk (a lamp by his side flickered on) and he began to pore through the reports on the terminal. It came up with some statistics about the Sunshine Vault, such as the number of occupants being fifty-seven, which was quite a small number considering the size of the place. Lawman scrolled down and there was a list of names of all the Vault's residents starting with the overseer, chief science staff, and security goons. They numbered sixteen in total; one overseer (called Turnbull), five science staff and ten security guards. Then there were the names of the remaining civilian residents. Lawman did a quick scan of some of their profiles.

Amongst the most interesting was a Bertrand T. Beacznik; a quick read of his profile revealed that he was in fact 'Berty Beat' who ran the Sunshine Disco Parlour that Barry the protectron had mentioned. Apparently he was a raging alcoholic and was involved in cocaine trafficking back in his old life, the details of which Lawman was startled to find listed intricately and explicitly in his profile. Apparently, Berty Beat had had ties to something called 'the Cartels'. From what Lawman could make of them they sounded a bit like the post-war tribes who produced and traded drugs. Lawman, being the former sheriff that he was, raised his eyebrows; _Berty Beat was a very naughty boy_. Lawman wondered how he got through the Vault Tec vetting process, only to immediately answer his own question. It was obvious: _Money_.

Then there was Mrs. Martha Braun. Lawman was taken aback when he saw her profile picture. She was a very buxom lady with a delicate, smiling face, and piercing grey eyes. Reading her profile though, she didn't seem to be special in any other way. She had been an Administrative Assistant at the Vault Tec Construction Subsidiary, which Lawman guessed was why she was permitted entrance to the vault at Sunshine. She was wife to Mr. David J. Braun and the mother of two children, William and Mary (five and twelve years old respectively), who all made it into the vault with her. Her husband was apparently one of the construction workers for Vault Tec so Lawman guessed they'd both met at work.

Arthur Applecroft was, on the other hand, quite fascinating. His profile was the most detailed and appeared to have been written on the fly as a stream of consciousness – and the consciousness of a very bitter individual at that. This guy was never supposed to have been permitted entrance to the vault. Apparently he had managed to bluff his way onto the last tram journey and the guards had only realized their mistake when it was too late and the doors had been sealed shut. Arthur had been an investigative journalist who had proved to be a thorn in Vault Tec's side for some time. He'd repeatedly interviewed employees of the Vault Tec Company and, according to the profile, been a nuisance to the Safehouse Project. No details were given as to how the man had become a nuisance. He did, however, have a reputation for ignoring Press Censorship and Gagging laws and irreverence for authority. The profile ended with the recommendation that Vault Tec employees and vault residents should have limited contact with the man.

The lamp by Lawman's side flickered slightly as Vyatch came around and peered over his shoulder.

The last person Lawman scrolled through was Zelda P. Winfred. Her profile was interesting simply because there was so little in it. She was the wife of Herbert Winfred and was one of the chief scientists in the vault. Her husband hadn't made it to the tram in time, leaving her knowing no one in the vault other than her work colleagues. She was described as being stolid and diligent, a regular workaholic, and she mostly shied from company. Apparently she was under suspicion and lengths were taken to keep her under watch. Nothing else was said.

"Well," Carter grunted impatiently. "Is there anything there? Any information about the vault?"

"Only a load of junk about the different residents," Vyatch answered before Lawman could tear his eyes away from the screen. Vyatch tapped the name 'Bertrand T. Beacznik' on the screen. "I like this guy," he rumbled.

"What the hell are we hangin' around here for, then?" Carter retorted. "We need to find information about the tech file, not learn about some long dead fucks."

"We might learn more about what happened to this place if we-."

"I don't give a fuck, Lawman. We need to find the tech file. We need to find Lost Orleans. I don't give a damn about whatever messed up shit went down in this place, and as far as I'm concerned as long as we stay clear of that fuckin' basement, whatever the hell it is, we don't have to know…"

Suddenly there was a disturbing sound that trickled from the far end of the corridor.

They all looked ahead into the darkness. It took a while to notice but it steadily grew louder; _louder and closer_. It was the sound of something scuttling in the darkness, as though along the walls or ceiling, and it was headed straight for them.

Vyatch drew out his gun and the Cazadors turned their startled eyes to scanning the inky blackness that filled the corridor up ahead. Carter pointed the Colt 45, cruel eyes trained directly ahead, ready to blast whatever was coming for them to kingdom come, just as soon as it entered the light above the swiveling office chair. Lawman's skin drew pale. It was no normal sound. The scuttling scurried closer until it reached them, but when it did nothing poured out of the darkness. It was so loud it felt it was all around them, the scratching sound surrounding them, filling their ears. Yet nothing was there. The Cazadors' guns frantically followed the sound, swerving to point the other way as it passed. Then it faded away behind them, leaving the crew perplexed, scared and with an itchy feeling all down their arms, as though they had been swarmed by invisible spiders.

The scuttling subsided into the chilling silence Lawman could never grow accustomed to.

"The fuck was that?" Vyatch growled.

"Radroaches in the vents. It must have been," Katherine answered, not altogether convinced of her own response.

"Pfft." Carter holstered the revolver and rolled his eyes. "Nothing to be scared of then. Just some overgrown bugs."

Lawman hoped Katherine was right as they all made their way down the corridor to the Orientation room. There was always an impenetrable veil of darkness that lingered in front as light after light flickered on. More disturbingly though, the soft cones of light they'd stepped out from died, snuffed out one by one, so that a solid wall of darkness closed in on them, stalking them along the corridor, leaving the way back lost in a swirl of inky blackness. The sound of their own footsteps echoed down the hall, bouncing back and making it sound like the darkness that followed them had footsteps of its own. It became hard to tell which sounds were your footsteps and which were the echo as they hung in the silence.

Lawman was grateful when he finally reached the orientation room and found himself facing a room similar to one of those old world cinemas. It felt cozier than the corridors. As each of them stepped into the room, a silver screen startled them as it suddenly lit up the wall in front of them, the projector whirring to life above their heads. It wasn't long before Lawman's uneasiness was dialed up to eleven, as, up on the silver screen, he found himself gazing up at Mr Kees. No, _wait._ It wasn't Mr Kees. _Kees wasn't this tall_. For a moment it looked like him – minus the walking stick. But the white suit and the glasses seemed the same for a fraction of a second.

It was Giles Wolstencroft.


	15. Scene 15

**Scene 15**

It was Giles Wolstencroft.

Lawman recognized him from the statues. He wasn't standing though. Instead he was seated cross legged in a plush leather armchair on the grainy black and white screen in front of them, leafing through a book as though no one was filming him. After a moment he turned to the camera in feigned surprise and smiled. Lawman thought it was a slick smile; more slippery than a deep ocean oil spill. If Lawman was feeling generous he'd describe it as the smile of a salesman, but Lawman was deep underground in a place that creeped him out more with every passing second. He wasn't in a generous mood.

It was the smile of a liar.

"Oh, why hello there," Wolstencroft greeted them through the screen. He closed his book and placed it on a side table before fixing the camera with his full attention. "Welcome to Vault-Tec. And a big welcome to your new life underground. I know this will be disorientating for you, but understand that if you are fortunate enough to be watching this, then you are amongst the lucky few who have survived a nuclear exchange, which of course means that you carry with you the responsibility of continuing on the legacy of these great United States of America; our culture, our traditions, and, of course, all of our undying duties as U.S. citizens at war. For these are the heritage of the founding fathers, and although times may look bleak, remember that so long as fine blooded Americans like you flourish, wherever you might be, old glory shall once again fly over this great land, untarnished from the communist menace, fluttering from sea to shining sea…"

"What does 'communist' mean?" Carter blurted.

"Something to do with 'China'," Lawman answered, having seen the faded old propaganda posters before, "some old enemy from before the war."

Lawman paced forward, closer to the image of Wolstencroft, until the shadow of his head reared up from the bottom of the silver screen.

"…And you, dear citizens of Sunshine, Louisiana, are especially lucky. Because this is, after all, the wonderful country town that raised me from boyhood into manhood, from where I went on to become Assistant CEO and then Acting CEO at Vault Tec – the company that guarantees the future of our great nation well beyond any calamity. As such, I have spared no expense in the construction of this facility. It is the pinnacle of scientific and technological know-how, with the capability to carry forward all Vault Residents, and the generations who follow your pioneering spirit, well into the next century and even into the centuries beyond that.

"Vault-Tec is here for you - Just like how this town was there for me when I was growing up." And here, just for a fleeting second, Lawman saw Wolstencroft's smile grow sharper, and his eyes glinted dangerously. Wolstencroft had too good a façade to let it slip for too long though. If you blinked you'd miss it. But all the same it sent chills running down Lawman's spine.

"Well, down to business," Wolstencroft resumed his speech, his slick smile once again lighting up the screen. "All Vault residents will have their own rooms located on the second floor in the residential area. A guide employed by Vault Tec shall be the one who shows you around all the different sectors shortly. Before that, however, you shall each be issued with your very own Vault Tec jumpsuit, which will replace your old clothes. In a moment you will each go to the changing rooms where you will change attire. Once changed, you shall hand your old clothes to the Overseer and his men, and they'll safely dispose of them. I am afraid you can't keep them as they do pose a contamination risk. The good news is that none of you need to worry about fashion anymore, as they all come in the same color and style! Now none of you fellas need to wait so long for your gal to get dressed when you want to go to the ball, am I right?"

Wolstencroft feigned a jovial laugh, which felt shallow and glib. Lawman almost expected to hear canned laughter crackling from the speakers.

"Well, it's time for me to take my leave now. In a moment I'll turn you over to Overseer Turnbull. But, if I may, I'll just leave you with one important footnote. In this Vault there are a number of areas that are absolutely off-limits. Unless otherwise directed by your Overseer you should never enter the Vault's sub-levels. There is nothing to see there, and it may endanger you should you gain entry, so it behooves me as the Acting CEO of Vault-Tec to caution you to steer well clear of the basement.

"Godspeed and God bless loyal Americans, and once again I welcome you to your exciting future as part of Project Safehouse."

The crew was left staring at Wolstencroft's lingering smile for a moment before some old world patriotic tune flared up. The screen faded to a waving old world flag, and the song and the reel finally finished with the words, ' _…from sea to shining seeeeaa…'_

Then the company were plunged into darkness as the silver screen vanished, the crackling from the speakers suddenly died, and the eerie silence returned.

Slowly the light overhead flickered back on and the company blinked their bleary eyes in the sudden wash of artificial light.

"Did everyone speak like a fuckin' pussy back then?" Carter sneered. "What a crock of shit!"

"There was that warning about the basement again," Vyatch rumbled.

"Tch, I tell ya, the sooner we get outta here the better," Katherine said. She rubbed her face with the side of her revolver.

"Not before we get what we fuckin' came here for," Carter growled. He stalked his way out of the Orientation room and back out into the corridor. The light outside flashed on. Lawman followed suit with Vyatch and Katherine staying close behind him. They kept a watchful eye on him. Lawman could feel their gaze burn the back of his neck.

They once again strode down the corridor, once again the darkness stalked close behind. It wasn't long before they stopped by two doors, one with the 'men' sign and one with the 'ladies' sign. Carter opened the door with his gun hand, sliding it back and stepping in sideways with his Colt 45 at the ready. The light inside flickered on but all that was revealed was a simple changing room. There was a security camera in the corner above the door. The room was remarkably clean – it had probably only been used once.

Carter turned to the security camera. Presumably it was there to make sure no heirlooms or clothes were hidden or stashed away when the residents changed. Carter pointed his gun at the camera with one eye closed, and pretended to shoot it. He twizzled the Colt 45 around his finger and then holstered it. He looked around the clean white tiled room one last time, scanning the neat rows of beech wood benches, but saw nothing of interest. He left the room into the corridor.

There was a sign opposite the two doors pointing further down the corridor. It read 'Elevator to Residential Level.'

The Cazador's turned to each other and Carter nodded at them, as though to say the room was clear. Vyatch prodded Lawman's back with his gun and once again Lawman lead the way down the corridor until they reached the end – another elevator that led further down into the vault. He pushed the button. The doors tinged open. The soft cone of light inside flickered on invitingly.

Lawman and the rest of the crew stepped inside.

This elevator didn't take as long as the first one did to take them down. It soon came to a jerky stop and slid its doors open to reveal a vast foyer. Lawman stepped out upon a large balcony that encircled it. Along the sides of the balcony were the residential spaces where forty-one of the residents of the Sunshine Vault lived (the overseer, security guards and scientists had their separate rooms). Down below was where all the shops and eating places were. Once it would have all been bathed in light. It would have been open, inviting, and modern. Now, without the light, the vast area was a swirl of grey shapeless silhouettes, a foreboding cavernous space filled with darkness, shadows and winding corridors branching off to the side that plunged deeper into blackness.

Lawman took a tentative step forward and heard his footstep echo eerily through the empty foyer. The first light a few feet ahead of him flickered to life, and Lawman could just see, over the balcony, in the space below, the silhouette of tables and chairs. They'd been overturned, piled up on top of each other as though to form a barricade. Lawman looked to the wall on his other side and saw bullet holes. It looked like the residents had ripped each other apart, _or something else had_.

Lawman felt a gun prod him in the back. He turned around.

"That way," Vyatch rumbled as he pointed down one of the corridors that branched off from the foyer.

Lawman did what he was told. He went down the dark corridor, feeling the walls beside him to negotiate his passage. The lights down there must have been broken or something because they didn't flicker on. Instead Lawman switched on his pip-boy light and made his way to the bottom of the passage where the path forked at two doors standing opposite each other. One was marked 'William Stein' and the other was once labelled, 'Herbert Winfred', but that name had been crossed out and replaced with, 'Arthur Applecroft'.

Lawman remembered Zelda P. Winfred's profile and how her husband hadn't made it to the vault. Apparently, the Overseer had refitted the room for the investigative journalist who was never supposed to have been there in the first place. Lawman wondered how Zelda had felt about this.

He chose to go into the room whose name he recognized, and found it to be a tip. He almost immediately tripped over a vault jumpsuit that was sprawled on the floor as he stepped inside. The light overhead tried to flicker on, but soon frazzled into darkness. Instead, as Lawman stepped further inside, a bed side lamp switched on and bathed the bedroom with its warm orange glow.

Lawman spotted a luxurious writing desk the other side of the room, opposite the bed and near to the door to the en-suite. He found scribbled notes scattered all over it. None of them seemed particularly interesting. They were just numbers and jottings that made little to no sense. Some were in black ink and every now and again red ink would be used to encircle the odd figure or write exclamation marks.

Lawman tried to open the desk's drawers but found them locked.

"My lock picking kit…" He said, turning to the others.

"What about it?" Carter retorted.

"I need it," Lawman replied. "Unless, of course, you'd rather blast the lock open with my gun…"

Carter fished in his satchel and carelessly chucked the lock picking kit to him. Lawman caught the thing as it flew towards his head. "Gee, thanks Carter. You're a doll."

"Just get the fuckin' thing open."

Lawman used the tiny screwdriver and bobby pin, twisting them until he heard a faint click. He opened the drawer and found two things inside: a brown leather backed journal, and an audio cassette dated, 25th October 2077. Lawman turned to the back of the journal. The last entry was dated, 'March 7th, 2083'.

He moved over to the bed, sitting on it by the warm glow of the bedside lamp. The entry read, 'I'm going down to the basement today. Turnbull finally agreed to show me what's down there. If it's a problem with the reactor that is causing the power outages and keeping the water recycling systems from working, then the only way to fix it is by going through the basement. I'm glad Turnbull has finally listened to reason. I sense it might well be dangerous, but someone needs to do something and none of the damn scientists or security, let alone Turnbull, have seemed willing to talk about the problem to anyone else. I will need their help, of course, I doubt it will be as easy as changing a light bulb, but I'm pleased Turnbull turned to me for the task. If I can locate the source of the vault's problems then I'm sure the egg heads can do the rest. It's been a rocky relationship at times, I've often been critical of how he runs things down here, but I feel Turnbull and I might, at last, be beginning to respect one another. I'm pleased he trusts me with this task. To be honest, I've never quite felt like I belonged here. The other residents still ignore me. It's as though I should have drowned in the nuclear fire back when it all began. However, I hope that through this act I can finally become an accepted member of the Vault.'

Lawman raised his eyebrows. So after less than six years the vault dwellers were already doing what they'd been told never to do. Although, he granted the fact that if the water recycling system had stopped working the vault must have been in deep trouble. Trouble enough that the Overseer would seek the help of a resident to fix the problem in the basement… _instead of one of his own men?_ Something, about that didn't add up. Why was this Overseer Turnbull sending an investigative reporter to fix the issue in the basement? _Perhaps the guy volunteered?_ It certainly sounded like he'd been inquiring about the basement for a long time beforehand. Were Turnbull and the scientists permitted entrance into the basement? Did they know what was down there? And if they did why didn't _they_ go down?

Lawman handed the journal over to Vyatch, who began to leaf through it with the others. Lawman turned his attention to the audio cassette dated, '25th October 2077' – Just under six years before Arthur's last journal entry.

He slotted it into his pip-boy and listened as the static crackled through the room. There was a whir and a clunk as the thing began its recording.

"…Why am I so cynical when I have so much to be thankful for?" the crackling voice of what Lawman assumed to be Arthur filled the room. Vyatch continued reading the journal, but Katherine and Carter looked over towards Lawman. Lawman felt eerily similar to how he felt when he was amongst the trees by the burned wreckage of the vertibirds, listening to the last recorded words of Paladin Salter, piecing together who the unseen enemy had been.

"Exactly," another voice answered back with an indignant tone. "Why are you so cynical when you're one of the few who has survived the blast. There's so many out there…So many out there are just dead. Anybody else would be thanking their lucky stars just to be alive down here."

Lawman heard Arthur laugh. It was an aged, tired and forlorn laugh.

"Bill," Arthur answered patiently, "You don't get it. The occupation of Canada wasn't some patriotic preemptive strike to preserve freedom. It was pure Bismark. Nineteenth century realpolitik in the twenty-first century. There was nothing noble about it. They had the resources so we took them. We needed military access through to Alaska, so we stormed through the only country that shared a land border with the damn place. The whole Sino-American war is an exercise in brutality - from both sides."

"So now you're comparing us to the commies? You could be imprisoned for less."

"Not much chance of that now is there."

"You smug bastard, don't you realise you owe it to American capitalism that you're even safe inside this vault? It was freedom loving people and the prosperity they generate that gave you this shelter!"

"You want to talk about American capitalism and Vault Tec?"

"Vault Tec is a fine example of the American entrepreneurial spirit…"

"Well, I've seen Vault Tec's accounts, Bill. And let me tell you, I've never seen so much red ink in all my life."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean it takes some seriously dark arts in accounting to be drowning in that much red ink and to stay afloat…"

A new voice, harsher than the first two, suddenly spoke up. "What are you two discussing?"

"Uh, nothing Officer MacConnaugh," the voice of Bill stammered. "We were just…we were just leaving."

Lawman heard footsteps clap away down a hall through the crackling of the audio cassette. It was a while before Lawman heard another set of footsteps pacing slowly closer, up to the recording device.

"Having fun, Arthur?" MacConnaugh's voice was menacing. Lawman imagined the man sneering as he leant into Arthur's face. "You know the Overseer will hear of this."

"Well, then you better get going, Macky. You don't want to keep your master waiting."

"One day, Applecroft, you'll ask the wrong question, and d'you know what will happen?"

Lawman found himself admiring Arthur's cool as he replied, "Tell me."

There was a pause as Lawman imagined MacConnaugh leaning his sneering face in closer. "You'll get the answer..." And, with that, Lawman heard the officer turn, and his footsteps made their way down the hall.

"… _Fools_ ," Arthur breathed.

The recording whirred and clunked to a stop.

Lawman couldn't pretend to understand much of what had been discussed, but he had begun to understand much better what Arthur had meant when he said that his and Turnbull's relationship was a ' _rocky_ ' one. It was easy to see how the guy aggravated authority. He was like a sheriff, in his own way; he always stuck his nose in other people's business and got himself into trouble. And, he guessed, Arthur sounded like he wanted justice too, or, at least, the truth. It took Lawman a long time to learn that 'justice' was a hard mistress. He wondered if Arthur had felt the same way.

Carter had the journal now and he impatiently turned through the pages, almost ripping them apart as he flicked through it. He angrily tossed it aside. "Is there nothing in this damn vault that will tell us about the fuckin' tech file?"

"What about the Overseer's office?" Katherine replied. "There's sure to be something in there, hon'." She stroked his arm affectionately.

"The Overseer's Office… Fine," Carter said at last. "Let's go to the overseer's office."

Lawman could see Carter was hesitant to go there though. He might even have been a little scared. Lawman remembered that the Overseer's office had been the only route through which to get to the basement, so Lawman shared his anxiety.

The company made their way out of the room and down the stairs at the far end of the balcony. They ambled their way past the dark barricades of chairs and tables, Lawman's pip-boy lighting the way. Several skeletons lay sprawled in their vault jumpsuits over the metal barricades, emerging in the green light before slipping away again into darkness. Occasionally there would be one in security guard attire; stab proof vest, helmet and 10mm pistol clutched in its fleshless hand. The bodies seemed to become scarcer the closer that they made it to the far door. It was labelled, 'Overseer's Office' with an arrow pointing up the stairs beyond, which led the way up into a veil of darkness. Apparently, this had been what the ten security guards scattered throughout the foyer had tried to protect, seemingly from the residents.

They stepped slowly up the steps, Lawman's pip-boy lighting the way like a faint green beacon, before finally reaching a sliding door. It was locked tight, but it only took a few moments for Lawman to open it with his lock picking skills.

Once they stepped inside they found themselves in a large space with a round metal desk that 'screamed' authority as you approached it. It was the sort of desk a boss uses to intimidate you with, to peer over at you as you sweated on the other side of it. No light came on as they entered the room (another burnt out lightbulb), but Lawman did spot some silvery light shimmer from behind the desk, making the shadows recede to the corners of the room. As Lawman walked around it to the seat, he was startled to discover a line of flickering monitors, all in black and white, but each overlooking a different part of the vault.

Once again he remembered the Vault Status Report from earlier: 'Security Cameras: minimal'. The cameras they had all come across as they penetrated deeper into the vault were working. Lawman spotted one screen that showed him the vault entrance where the tram used to be. He could see Vance slouched by the railing. For a moment Lawman thought the tough old nut had passed away, but then he saw him move slightly, lifting his head.

He even spotted the monitor that overlooked the changing rooms…and one that overlooked the foyer. If all the vault residents weren't dead they would have spotted the crew arrive a long time ago.

Carter looked over Lawman's shoulder and saw the terminals too.

"Hey, Vance, you still hearin' us okay?" Carter grunted into his walkie-talkie. It crackled in the silence.

They both saw Vance react in the monitor, grudgingly picking up his own walkie-talkie.

"Yeah, I'm still here," he wheezed. He gave a spluttering cough. "Y'hear okay?"

"Everything's loud and clear our end," Carter replied.

Lawman also spotted a computer terminal by the side of the monitors, and beyond the desk were two sets of doors that led the way to the Vault Tec employee's residential spaces and the science offices. However, it was beneath the desk that Lawman was wary of. Just behind the office chair was a grid that was labelled 'basement'. Lawman could readily believe that some computer prompt from the terminal would override the quarantine, making the grid slide backwards, revealing a set of stairs or a ladder or something that would lead down into… _just whatever the hell it was that lurked down there._

Lawman steered clear of the Overseer's computer, at least for now. He noticed there was a space next to it that was a socket for his pip-boy, which he had no idea what it was used for. Also, he didn't wish to accidentally press the wrong button while he was hacking into it. Instead he moved towards the science offices. If he could glean information about the tech file without triggering a shutdown of the quarantine then it would be better for everyone as far as Lawman was concerned.

"Just where do you think you're goin'?" Katherine interrogated him.

"You want to learn about the tech file, right?" Lawman countered.

"The Overseer's terminal is here."

"And the Science offices are this way. Which do you think is more likely to give us what we're looking for?"

Carter dragged his attention away from the monitors and looked over to Vyatch. "Go with him," he commanded. "Make sure he doesn't do anything he regrets."

"Yes, boss," Vyatch rumbled.

Carter resumed studying the monitors with Katherine. Meanwhile, Lawman and Vyatch headed through the door into the Science Offices. Lawman immediately gravitated to the cubicle marked 'Zelda Winfred'. He powered up the terminal and scoured through the scientist's reports.

It proved to be more revealing than Lawman had bargained for.


	16. Scene 16

**Scene 16**

Zelda P. Winfred. She was one of the five science officers in the vault, but what exactly their job description was Lawman still had no clue. That is he didn't, until the green words and letters began to spill upon the old computer screen, lighting the small office cubicle in that strange eerie half-light that only made the darkness more pronounced. It sent Lawman's and Vyatch's shadows dancing away from them, climbing the wall behind them, and hunching over them as they reached the ceiling. There they loomed, like angular, hooded specters watching over their every breath.

Over on the far side of the office, beyond the cubicles, was another door. Lawman was just able to see it, blanketed by the dark, from his seat inside the cubicle. He recalled the map he'd seen at the entrance to the vault. If he remembered correctly, that door led through a winding tunnel to the stockroom, which the medical bay also shared a link to. From there Lawman had forgotten the rest, but he guessed that it would be reasonable to expect it had access to the doctor's clinic, which would lead him back around to the foyer. Lawman eyed the hefty looking handgun in Vyatch's hands, gleaming in the unnatural green light. He decided it was probably best he focused on the screen in front of him.

Once it had loaded, and Lawman had spent a lengthy amount of time hacking into the damn thing, the screen read, 'Hello, Zelda. Welcome back.'

It then listed report after report down the screen, each of them dated. Lawman couldn't find anything like a mission statement or anything, so he simply clicked on the first one, which was dated '23rd October 2077' and watched as the green words tumbled upon the screen.

It read, 'The residents have arrived. They've all been through orientation and, as of midnight, all old garments have been successfully destroyed. They have all been given the tour and they've been allocated their own rooms. Vault Tec decided long ago that separate rooms and greater personal space leads to less infighting and quarrels. Studies demonstrate this to be true. If any couples wish to share rooms then they are of course permitted, but should there be problems then Vault Tec Security are on hand to separate any trouble makers.

'Most of the residents were listless and bewildered as they arrived. Some still believe it is just a drill. This is to be expected and shall pass with time and conditioning. Soon normal life – Vault life – will take hold once more.

'There are a couple of issues that exist with the residents, however. While most are complicit subjects who have excellent mental health, a few exceptions exist. Namely Bertrand T. Beacznik and Arthur. Beacznik is a deeply troubled man with a criminal history and a sense of entitlement that is as big as his ego. He is personal friends with Overseer Turnbull so it is understandable that he'd be on the list, however I foresee complexities occurring should he be given a completely free rein. His mental health is questionable and his physical health with all the alcohol he drinks is bound to suffer. He is liable to be a great expense to our medical resources.

'Arthur has no problems with his mental health but he has proven to be obstinate and irreverent. While I do not suggest action at this moment in time it is advised that an eye be kept on him to ensure he integrates well with others. I have confidence that with time Arthur should prove to be an asset to this vault.

'In other news, the experiments have started out a success. We've had a lot of time leading up to this and so far the Calculator is functioning perfectly well, as is the one in Vault 0. I was concerned at the beginning that using death row inmates for the machine might prove counter-productive due to questions surrounding their psychological make-up, especially as Vault 0 are using some of the world's greatest minds. However, the Calculator appears to have sublimated any inadequacies in the subjects it uses and, so far, is running smoothly. It shall be interesting to compare differences in both machines' output over time. Should anything happen to Vault 0 it is good to know that we're on stand-by as the back-up network relay point.

'Of course all appropriate measures have been set in place to keep the inner workings of the vault a secret from the residents. They are simple people, still clinging to their ignorant beliefs in the divine like children who cling to teddy bears for comfort. If they knew what it was that kept the lights on they would be, to say the least, disturbed. Discretion should be maintained by staff at all times. As head of the Science Office, I shall make sure no one learns what lies in the basement.

'Zelda Penelope Winfred.'

"What does it mean by 'Calculator'?" Vyatch rumbled from behind Lawman's seat.

Lawman had no clue. He scanned through the report a second time, murmuring to himself as he scanned through the flickering green words. "'Vault 0'… 'death row inmates'… 'Calculator' … 'Network relay point'…"

Lawman turned to Vyatch. "The only thing that kinda makes sense so far is the bit about this place being a network relay point."

"What does that tell us?"

"Nothing we don't already know." Lawman turned back to the screen. "It just means that all Vault Tec info might have been funneled through this vault onto somewhere else…"

"Lost Orleans?"

"It doesn't say so far."

Vyatch leant over and tapped the screen with his gun. "Read the next report. See what it says."

Lawman didn't object. The next report was dated, '10th Novemeber 2077.'

'I have submitted my complaint to Overseer Turnbull. To allow Beacznik into the vault is one thing, but to make him the head of Security is a gross miscalculation of character and threatens to disrupt and destabilize the vault. So far the residents have been getting along well these past eighteen days. There has been little to distract my team from their vital work. But _this_? Turnbull knows as well as I do that Beacznik's psychological profile does not condone his elevation to a position of authority – and now he's been made the second in command? With this move Turnbull has turned his security team into a band of thugs. This is unlikely to end well.

'The Calculator runs as normal. There have been no anomalies as of yet and absolutely no degradation of the test subjects. The hardware of the computer system and its organic counterparts seem to have fused together perfectly, and are functioning seamlessly as one entity. I had some misgivings about using the FEV virus to preserve the organic elements of the Sunshine Calculator, but so far it has done its job perfectly fine. It's too early to tell, but who knows? Perhaps the twelve inmate brains of the Sunshine Calculator can outperform the eight eccentric brains of Vault 0's Calculator. Only time will tell.

'Arthur approached me, inquiring about the basement again. I told him the same story we've been told to give to any and all querying civilians; that it only contains the reactor and some important wiring that should never be interfered with, and so on. But he doesn't believe it. He says his lights keep flickering in strange ways. I asked him how it was strange and he replied that he thought it was in Morse code, and that his lights were signaling for help, over and over again. It'll be just some faulty wiring of course, and I said as much. Perhaps, the vault is getting to Arthur more than I thought it would? Nevertheless, I expect Arthur shall learn to drop the issue with time.'

 _Brains?_ Lawman scanned the report, checking he'd read that right. _'…twelve inmate brains of the Sunshine Calculator…'_

"What does it all mean?" Vyatch asked in a more perturbed voice than Lawman had been expecting as he leant over the screen. "What in the hell is this fuckin' Calculator."

"I don't know," Lawman breathed, "but it sounds like it's part computer and part human, as though it uses human brains as part of its computer matrix. The brains of twelve death row inmates."

"The FEV virus… _that's…_ "

"…the Forced Evolutionary Virus. The thing that made the Supermutants."

"Shit," Vyatch whispered conspiratorially as though they were amongst the pews of some cathedral and were being watched. "And they were using it to _preserve_ the …You don't think… you don't think it's still running do you?"

But Lawman remembered the Vault Status Report once more. ' _Lighting: minimal. Security cameras: minimal.'_ And lastly, _'Calculator: irreparable.'_

"No," Lawman said at last, almost with a sigh of relief. "Something's destroyed it. Whether it was time, or… _something else_ , I don't know."

They both turned back to the screen and Lawman anxiously clicked on another report, further down the list. It was dated 'March 4th, 2083.' _Three days before Arthur's last journal entry…_

'I'm worried about Arthur. He continues to be ostracized by the other residents and the isolation over the last six years seems to have taken its toll. He no longer seems the same person he used to be. Nevertheless Turnbull has ordered that no one in the science department speak to him. I can't afford to spare a moment with him. And especially not in the current climate.

'The Calculator has become unstable. It turns out the FEV virus didn't just preserve the brains, one of them has had its cognitive capabilities heightened well beyond what the inorganic component of the Sunshine Calculator can handle. The vault is facing power outages and there's been a shut down in the water recycling unit. I can't understand how this is happening. It's almost as though the brains in their vats are... But no, that's just ridiculous.

'To make matters worse there has been another tussle between some of the civilians and Beacznik's thugs. I'm proud to see that not all the security staff were on Beacznik's side, but this Martha Braun situation can't go on. It's sickening. And I don't care if Turnbull reads this.

'The situation is turning desperate. If this vault is going to survive then we need to find a way to fix the Calculator, and soon.'

Lawman wordlessly clicked out of that report and clicked into the next. It was labelled 'March 9th 2083.'

'I stopped believing in God well before the day the bombs fell. And in truth, I had started turning my faith to Science well before even that, but one thing I know is that Science doesn't forgive. Science has no compassion. All Science cares about are empirical facts. That's what I believed was all I cared about too. Now I know that was not true.

'What we did to Arthur was just horrifying. I feel, in my gut, that with this action we have crossed the Rubicon. There is no turning back. It was one thing to experiment upon Death Row inmates who had willingly signed up for the program, but to trick a fellow resident and then forcibly extract his brain…

'I have committed a grave crime. I cannot blame it on Turnbull, on Beacznik, on peer pressure, or on any of my staff. I shed my humanity the moment I took the scalpel to Arthur's forehead and watched the blood trickle over his face.

'All that matters is the science. That is what all this was for. With the replacement of one of the FEV infected brains with Arthur's brain the vault systems have stabilized. The vault has been made secure once more and life can resume as normal.

'Questions will be asked about Arthur. We will say that he died a hero, helping us to fix a problem in the basement. The lie turns sour in my mouth, and it almost makes me want to vomit, but I'm now tied up in this sick deception with Turnbull and his cronies. If he goes down for this then so do I, and when the vault residents are so riled up over this Martha Braun business I can be certain that should word get out then things will turn ugly, fast.

'If things go well then, hopefully, the vault will remain stable. The question remains though; if it doesn't, then who will be next?'

Lawman didn't understand what Zelda meant by the 'Martha Braun business', but he intuitively pieced together what had happened next. The vault hadn't stabilized, at least not for long. Soon they would have been sacrificing more people to the Calculator, all in an effort to keep the vault systems running. People would have begun to know that something was up - Turnbull couldn't possibly keep tricking people into going into the basement, so Lawman felt sure he'd have had to try something else. Perhaps he'd used Beacznik and his security thugs to kidnap residents, to break into their apartments at night and take them away. Perhaps he'd begun to use the calculator's malfunctioning as an excuse to eliminate opponents to his tyranny. Lawman didn't know, but either way, he had a sense already of who this man, Turnbull, was. He'd faced off with such people before; cowards who hide behind their goons. He knew that whatever Turnbull had done, two things had happened: The truth had gotten out about the basement, and there had been a revolt.

Lawman had no idea how many people were sacrificed on the altar of this perverted science, how many people were offered up to the Calculator that kept them alive like some fucked up deity, but he did know that the foyer had since remained a killing field, meaning nobody had stayed long in the vault afterwards. They'd either all died after the revolt, or whoever had been left had escaped and deserted the place.

Lawman was about to close down the terminal, too nauseous to wish to learn anything more about what had happened, until he spotted the last entry. It had no date and was simply titled, 'Obituary'. Going against every fiber of his being, which told him to pull away, he clicked on it.

'Everything has come crashing down,' Lawman read as he wiped his brow of the cold sweat glistening under the flickering glare of the terminal's screen.

'After Turnbull passed away, Overseer Beacznik could not maintain control – too hooked up on drugs from the medical bay to control even himself. Now William Braun has killed every last one of us in on the conspiracy, temporarily sparing only myself for reasons I'm still uncertain of. He's allowed me to write my own obituary on this computer. I'm unsure if he means it to be some sort of torture but I no longer care. I feel grateful for the opportunity to write some final words. I knew justice would catch up with me, with all of us, sooner or later. I could never get the nightmares out of my head. I had always thought the brains were dead things before, but I've never since been able to shirk the inalienable feeling that in some way they were always waiting… Waiting for something to slip.

'I always sensed things would come to a head, but I never thought William would be the one to lead the vault rebellion, let alone emerge triumphant. He had help from some of the former security guards who were disgruntled with Beacznik, but he's changed a lot from the bewildered five year old boy I once saw shuffling his way into the vault all those years ago. His father's murder, mother's rape and sister's brutalisation have changed him – Darkened him.

'Perhaps soon they will kill me. It's what I deserve, and it will be a relief when they do. Living with what I did all these years, sitting on what I knew, hating myself for the atrocities we committed – I was glad when I finally spoke the truth at last, even if it was in my autumn years. When I revealed to everyone else what had been happening I felt a huge weight lift off of my chest, despite the bloodshed since then. I still feel relieved that it will soon all be over for me.

'I warned them not to touch what lay in the basement, but the Calculator stopped them from leaving the vault so they had no choice. They took whatever brute instruments they could find and smashed apart the Vault Tec machine we'd been sacrificing our lives to this whole time. I tried to tell them they didn't know what they were doing. I yelled after them what dangers they could unleash. They didn't listen. Why would they after what I've done?

'The FEV virus leaked, contaminated those who entered the basement, and the reactor suffered a radiation leak. William had to seal them inside. Had no choice. I can still hear their anguished screams even now as I type my last words, and I know, deep in my heart, that it's my fault.

'The wealth of all Vault Tec research and data, from this vault and Vault 0, will have already been passed on, long ago, to the facility in New Orleans. The Overseer's terminal was linked up to the calculator and automatically streams data there from all the other vaults in the area and perhaps beyond.

'It has now become apparent that this place, along with vault 0, was never meant to succeed. We were just puppets in some grander scheme. I should have listened to Arthur more when I had the chance. We should have all done that. He was right. He'd always been right. For Vault-Tec this was all just a trial run – a trial run for something bigger.

'Soon the vault doors will be opened, but my guilt binds me to this place. I must stay behind. It was all a lie. This vault was never a safe haven. It wasn't even a tomb. It was a petri dish of nightmares.

'God save us all…'


	17. Scene 17

**Scene 17**

Lawman and then Vyatch both stepped through the tenebrous doorway and into the Overseer's office once more. Behind the intimidating desk of the long deceased Turnbull were stood Carter and Katherine. An orb of ghostly pale light emanated from the flickering monitors, casting a butterfly net of shadows. It was like an artificial, flickering moonlight that made Carter and Katherine's angular shadows feverishly dance on the far wall, as though the black figures were enraptured by the whispering silence that remained within the now desolate vault. Vyatch's heavy footfalls resounded through the old world chamber as he pressed his gun into the small of Lawman's back. Each step from his heavy boots punctured the silence like a dagger softly punctures a lung when you stab someone in the back. Carter and Katherine looked on ( _Impatiently? Impassively?_ Lawman couldn't quite tell). Their faces were half lit by the glaring light of the screens, and half shrouded by impenetrable darkness.

"Well?" Carter grunted as the two stepped closer. "Did you learn anything? Anything at all?"

"We know Lost Orleans exists – or at least did exist," Vyatch rumbled from behind. "What state it's been left in I've no clue, but this place and its Calculator was a, uh, _network relay point_ for, uh, all the other -."

"And just what the fuck is that supposed to mean?" Carter snapped. Lawman saw he was pugnacious as ever, and no doubt what little patience he possessed had been eroded away by his waiting in the shadows, trying to faff with the Overseer's terminal and failing to get it running. Lawman saw that the screen flashed with streams of code and no doubt Carter had made a mess of the damn thing. However, if any of them were going to find the location of Lost Orleans then Lawman knew that they had to hack into Turnbull's terminal. It was the one through which information was streamed to Lost Orleans. Perhaps there was still a connection…

Lawman's pensive gaze turned from the terminal back towards Carter for a moment. He noticed that Carter had holstered the Colt 45 for now and had left his satchel with his other guns by the side of the monitors. Lawman licked his lips without quite realising it. He stepped forward slightly, not enough to raise caution in any of the Cazador's but just enough to be noticed.

"This vault was responsible for passing on data to another facility in New Orleans," he interjected with a calmness that didn't match the sweatiness of his palms. Lawman began to feel the effects of the Med-X that Vyatch had hit him up with slowly fade away from him. He felt his lust for a cold stiff drink rear its ugly head out of the pit of numbness the Med-X had placed him in, his right hand beginning to twitch. _Not right now,_ he thought desperately, _not fuckin' now_. _I need my fuckin' wits about me. I need to think…_

"And?" Carter clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth, his lips twisting into an unseemly sneer.

"Lawman, honey, I hope you have more information than that." Katherine flicked her wastelander ponytail aside. "'Cause if you don't…"

"You're what? Gonna kill me? And then what you gonna use the terminal over there for? Cracking peanuts and holding your Pina Coladas? I don't think you're gonna crack that code any time soon. Not without me, anyway. And you're gonna want what's on there. Trust me. It's the only connection to Lost Orleans we might yet have. So why don't we get down to brass tacks."

Lawman knew he was playing a dangerous game. Carter's gun might be holstered, but he could see Katherine's revolver was held quite firmly in her pale hand and it was pointed directly at his chest. He was getting reckless, and the lack of food and water and alcohol was making matters worse. Still, that Med-X he was on continued to slip further out of his system. He wiped back a strand of his silver hair from out of his eyes.

Carter just glared.

"Go ahead then, Lawman," Katherine purred, in delicate yet sinister tones. Her narrow eyes glinted like shards of ice. "Tell us what you've learnt. You might want to keep from cutting off Vyatch like that in future though." She laughed. "He looks like he's about to take that gun and brain you with it."

Lawman glanced around and saw Vyatch's lips curl to reveal clenched teeth. Lawman turned back around to Katherine and responded with what he hoped was a winning smile. "Funny you should mention the word, 'brain'…"

He hoped it was a winning smile. He didn't feel like he was winning. He felt like he was sinking. He felt like he was a gambler fixated by the spin of a roulette wheel and that he'd already left his lucky streak far, far behind. But like any gambler he didn't know when to quit. He knew that, with Vyatch studying his hacking and his pip-boy when he used it, it wouldn't be long until he proved to be superfluous to the crew. He decided to hedge everything he had on one last gambit.

 _So let the roulette wheel spin and lady luck dance,_ Lawman thought. _It's time we settled this…_

He revealed everything. He told them about what had happened in the vault, the testimony of Zelda Winfred, the sordid details of what the Calculator had been and the sort of unnatural experiments that took place down in the basement. Finally he told them about how Zelda, in her last words, spoke of a connection that fed data to Lost Orleans – a connection that was linked directly to the Overseer's terminal.

All the while, as he spoke, Lawman inched his way gingerly around the desk.

Carter looked over to Vyatch, leaning over the intimidating desk, which was elevated a foot or so above the floor around it. "Is this true?" he asked him.

Vyatch gave a silent nod of the head.

"So what you're telling me," Carter hissed. "Is that we might as well have logged onto this terminal in the first place instead of wasting time searching the Science Offices!"

"Not at all," Lawman riposted. He held his ground but held up his hands in a placating gesture. "It's only by discovering what they did that we know what sort of data we're looking to track on the Overseer's terminal, and roughly when that data would have been sent."

"What?" Carter retorted.

"Look," Lawman explained, knowing not all of what he said was bullshit, but also knowing he didn't understand half as much as he was letting on. "When one computer communicates with another they share data. But that data is encoded so that no one can intercept the message, right? What that means is that the two computers share a key needed to break the code. That key is sent by the computer that wants to receive the message allowing the other computer doing the sending to encode it…"

"What's your point Lawman?" Katherine intoned.

"My point is this computer didn't just stream data to Lost Orleans. In order to stream the data, it had to receive a key from Lost Orleans itself…" And it was at this point that Lawman knew he was out of his depth, but he was on a roll, and instead of slowing down he ploughed straight on ahead.

 _Let lady luck dance._

"…That key can reveal where Lost Orleans is located. You see that portal there?" he pointed to the socket by the terminal that he could plug his pip-boy into. "I can use that to upload Lost Orleans' location straight to my Pip-Boy. Satisfied?"

In truth, he didn't know if the key would do anything of the sort. He didn't know if the computer was too damaged to allow access. He didn't know if the data had been corrupted. He didn't know if he could access the key. He didn't know a lot of things and all the time Lawman felt the roulette wheel make its final spin. The clock was ticking. He felt sure that after the trip to this vault he wouldn't be needed. If things went Carter's way then he wouldn't need Lawman to hack anymore terminals. If things didn't go Carter's way then Lawman wouldn't be able to turn it around for them. It was a catch 22. Vyatch might be a brute but Lawman knew that he was shrewd enough to pick up on the basics of his pip-boy. Soon it would be more valuable in his hands than Lawman's.

Besides, if Lawman played his cards right, the key might not matter.

"Alright then, Lawman," Katherine spoke with a deceptive calmness. She drew back her gun and slipped it into its holster. "Take the floor…"

This was it. He wasn't the world's greatest scavver and his hands were twitching and slippery with icy cold sweat, but he'd have to take the chance. He stared directly ahead at the terminal as he stepped forward. It didn't look too bad. As he got closer he could see where they'd both gone wrong hacking it. It would be a simple step to rectify what they'd done and then hopefully he could work his magic on what data was left on the ancient bundle of wires and circuit boards. But it wasn't his hacking skills that concerned him.

He stumbled slightly on one of the stairs and brushed against Carter. He had slipped past the satchel and the monitors when, before he could apologise, Carter's fingers snapped closed around his neck like a bear trap.

Lawman gasped as he found himself shoved against the desk, his eyes burning as they turned red, and his breath whistling through his throat. He staggered backwards as Carter leant over him. His breath was rank as Lawman's bleary gaze swam with the vision of Carter's ugly sneer.

"What's your game, Lawman?" Carter hissed.

"Wha…ch…wha' d'ya mean," Lawman gasped as Carter shoved him down further, tightened his grip and Lawman's fingernails scratched and scrambled against the surface of the table.

"You think you can bump into me and keep on walkin', you fag? You think you can talk big like nothin's gonna happen to you and then crash into me like that? Don't think I don't know you did that on purpose, you son of a bitch!"

Lawman' eyes glanced over to the screens. He couldn't help it. They locked on the thing that glinted dangerously in between two of the monitors. The gleaming metal cylinder slipped in and out of focus like a pendulum swings back and forth.

"Carter…" Lawman choked, struggling to not fight against the psychotic bastard's grip. His hand reached out, slowly inching towards the gap between the monitors. "…Carter. Let…go. You need… the terminal."

Somewhere behind Carter's face Lawman heard Katherine laugh.

Carter's hand inched towards his holster. If it reached it then Lawman knew his gambit would be over. He could sense that roulette wheel in his mind losing momentum, the ball clattering to a sudden stop.

Then Carter's hand froze.

"What the fuck?" he suddenly breathed as something crackled to his side.

His attention had turned to Lawman's Pip-Boy. The sound that all of a sudden emanated from it felt so very distant to Lawman, but as he turned he could see its screen light up and flicker as some scratchy old world tune sparked to life, as though catching a near dead radio signal through a long dark tunnel;

' _Children let me tell you…*crackle*…new kinda boogie man…*static*…eerie scream!'_

Lawman recognised the tune. It was Glen Gray's Boogie Woogie Man. That didn't explain why it abruptly killed the silence as it reverberated through the dark chamber in chilling bursts of fluctuating sound.

Had Lawman accidentally switched on the radio on the Pip-Boy? But even so there shouldn't be any signal – Lawman had checked obsessively for one during the river voyage and there was nothing but static. Was the signal emanating from somewhere inside the vault? Lawman couldn't think straight.

Carter's grip slipped from Lawman's neck as he darted over to one of the monitors. For a desperate second Lawman almost thought Carter had found what had been hid there. But he hadn't. Carter was transfixed by something on the screen.

' _So if you hear a piano…*crackle*…nobodies playing it…playing boogie like no…*static*…can!'_

Carter hogged the monitor and it took a moment for Lawman to glance at what he was looking at as he wheezed and gasped, catching his breath at last. Katherine's face grew pale as she looked over Carter's shoulder. Lawman stumbled forward.

Carter jerked at his walkie-talkie and switched it on, its static adding to the static of the pip boy. "Vance!" Carter barked into it, spittle forming at the corners of his mouth. "Vance! Can you hear me?"

'… _*crackle* every night when you're asleep he starts…'_

Vyatch watched on from a distance, his smirk had twisted into a look of confusion, as Carter continued to bark into the walkie-talkie. "Vance! Vance, fuckin' talk to me, you bastard cunt!"

The only response was static.

' _When it hits a rhythm and…*static*… feet start obeying it…'_

Lawman staggered, wheezing, to the monitor. He looked over Carter's shoulder and froze. It was the screen showing the tram station just outside the tunnel. He could just make out the tunnel's familiar trail of milky white lights, like eyes with cataracts, before they were swallowed by the inky blackness.

What dominated the screen was a perturbing figure standing just outside that tunnel. Lawman only caught a few details on the black and white monitor in the moment his eyes clasped hold of it. From what Lawman could make out on the fuzzy screen the figure had a long trailing overcoat blasted to one side by the gale outside, a black crucifix tattooed across its expressionless face, and blacker eyes that looked up at the camera – no, _through_ the camera – and bore into your own eyes as though he, whoever the figure was, could see you, as though you could never hide from him, as though he'd always known you were there.

'… _eerie scream!'_

The figure slowly raised Vance's walkie-talkie to his side, for the camera to see. Even on the black and white screen Lawman could tell it was splattered with blood. He dangled it for a moment, and then dropped it into the raging river. All around the figure the railings trembled, the river churned, the gridded walkway shivered in the wind – and yet the figure remained unnaturally still, motionless, amidst the fierce storm outside.

Carter's fists clenched. His knuckles turned white as bone.

"Who the fuck…?" Lawman breathed.

Then, as though the figure knew his message had been seen, he raised his gun. There was a flash before the monitor plunged into black. The shadows of the room inched closer from the corners.

They were left speechless. Only the eerie song from Lawman's pip-boy broke the silence:

' _Then look out! –_

… _It's the boogie woogie man!'_

Outside, amidst the howling gale and the crashing waves of the Mississippi, the figure turned to watch Vance die, leaning over him slightly and digesting every last moment with those cruel black eyes.

Vance's body sat crumpled by the side of the tunnel. Blood gurgled from his mouth, frothing at his lips as it drip dripped, first onto the gridded walkway, and then into the churning river below. His neck was snapped, his trachea crushed and splintered like one of those tree branches out there in the gathering storm. A shard of cartilage slit through the side of the dying man's neck, ribbons of rich red blood tracing its way down his side. Smoke rose from the barrel of the now empty luger that was clenched in his fist, slowly rising before being whipped away by the whistling wind. Vance's glassy, bloodshot eyes, for a moment, reflected the shadowy figure before him, before they finally lost their gleam. Slowly Vance's body ceased its twitching and lay still.

That part of his job done, the figure then rose, turned, and paced his way down the tunnel. He slipped away into its velvety darkness. His footsteps punctuated the silence like a full stop punctuates the end of a sentence.

Mr Graves had arrived.


End file.
